


Adrien AUgreste: The New World After the Wish

by DeathStorm908



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Adrien never went to school, Butterfly Emilie Agreste, Discussions of Kidnappings, Emilie Agreste's A+ Parenting, Gabriel Agreste is in a Coma, Gen, dark au, discussions of rape
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:14:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 21
Words: 34,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25658806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeathStorm908/pseuds/DeathStorm908
Summary: Hawkmoth had done it, it took a year and a half, but he finally has the Ladybug and Black Cat Miraculous, the defeated heroes and his foolish son had stood in his way for too long.  Even now they are screaming at him to stop, but nothing will stop Gabriel Agreste from his getting his wife back.  His disgrace of a son may hate him now, but soon history will be rewritten; Emilie will have never become sick, Gabriel would have no reason to become Hawkmoth, and his son would never be tainted by Ladybug and her school friends. "I wish my wife never found the Peacock Miraculous."The Miraculous glowed, and then the whole world glowed.  Gabriel smiled with the knowledge that everything will be as it should be.With history having been rewritten, Gabriel Agreste was the one that found the broken Peacock Miraculous, leading to his own magically induced coma.  Around the same time that Hawkmoth was supposed to start his reign of terror on Paris, Lycaena, the purple-edged butterfly, took his place, and she was more brutal and enjoyed being a villain more than Hawkmoth could have every dreamed.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Emilie Agreste, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Plagg, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Kagami Tsurugi, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 30
Kudos: 75





	1. Civilian

Adrien rolls over in bed and turned off the blaring alarm clock. It was usually annoying, which it needs to be to wake him up at 6:00am every morning, but for some reason it’s worse today. ‘ _Why am I so exhausted? There was no akuma last night, and I even went to bed at a normal time. Maybe I’m getting sick._ ’ As Adrien gets out of bed, he calls out, “Hey Plagg, it’s time for breakfast.” Adrien walks over to his minifridge and takes out a piece of Camembert, and holds it out for Plagg. “Plagg?” He looks around and finds Plagg still sleeping on his pillow. As he approaches, Adrien sees that Plagg is looking rather grey. “Plagg?” Adrien rushes over and scoops him up, “Hey buddy, wake up.” Adrien puts the piece of cheese in front of Plaggs nose, but the only response he gets is a groan.

Adrien puts Plagg back down on his pillow, and leaves the cheese next to him. Grabbing his phone, he sends a message to the superhero group chat.

The Chat’s Meow: Hey guys, Plagg is sick. He won’t wake up, not even to eat his cheese, and instead of black he looks grey. Are the other Kwami ok?

The Chat’s Meow: Master, do you know how to fix Plagg?

Knowing that he’s usually the first one awake, there’s nothing else to do other than getting ready for another day, so he heads to the bathroom to shower.

Once he’s done, he checks his phone on the way to breakfast.

Master: All of the Kwami in the Miracle Box are in the same condition. Kwami do get sick from time to time, and I can heal them, but I’ve never seen them all be sick at the same time before. Don’t try to transform, that’ll only make things worse.

Master: I’ll work on healing the ones I have right now. Chat Noir, I’ll collect Plagg and Longg when I see you tonight. Ladybug, can you collect the others and bring them to me during after school?

The Chat’s Meow: What will we do if there’s an akuma attack?

Master: That shouldn’t be an issue, as this has affected so many kwami, Nooroo and Duusu should be in the same state as the others. I should be able to have ours healed before Nooroo and Duusu heal naturally. Paris should be fine without superheroes for however long it takes.

The Chat’s Meow: Do you have any idea what happened?

Master: There must have been a sudden and major shift in the world, but I don’t see anything on the morning news that should explain it. Even the start of a major war hasn’t caused this kind of effect on the kwami.

Adrien opens the door to the dinning room, to see his mother already sitting in her seat. She also looks tired today as she scowls at her tablet in aggravation. “Good morning Mother.” Adrien sits in his seat across from her. Their two seats flank Gabriel’s empty seat, and they’ve eaten like this ever since his father fell into a coma over a year ago.

Emile looks up at him and smiles, “Good morning Adrien. Did you sleep well?”

“I think so, but I’m still feeling tired. Maybe I’m coming down with something.”

“Oh dear. Clair? Could you get Adrien some vitamins?”

“Of course, Mam.”

‘ _Clair, was that New Nathalie 14.0’s name?’_ After Gabriel fell into his coma, Nathalie was named CFO of the company, and ran the day to day business side of things, while Emile would go through Gabriel’s unused designs and present them to the design team for them create a line of outfits to go with Gabriel’s originals. To make that work, she took fewer acting jobs, but even then, their personal assistants couldn’t handle Emile’s erratic behavior and constant schedule changes.

Adrien checked his phone, to find that Ryoko, Rena Rouge, Carapace, Pegasus, King Monkey, Viperion, and Honey Bee were all in the same situation. Ladybug had yet to respond, but his understanding is that she likes to sleep in. After the first few battles, Master Fu realized that the villain, Lycaena, was much too dangerous and brutal for two heroes to handle things on their own. He reached out to Ladybug and Chat Noir, and asked them to identify potential temporary heroes. After a few successful missions, the original temporary heroes were promoted to fulltime heroes, but were generally kept on standby until their help was requested. A few more temporary heroes have been chosen, but they have minimal battle experience, and Master Fu has been too worried to let any more Miraculous be out full-time. Unfortunately, Chloe was Adrien’s only friend, and she failed the test, so until he had met Kagami, all of the heroes had been chosen by Ladybug or Master Fu. Kagami was the only hero that Ladybug didn’t know the identity of, while Adrien only knew about Kagami. There was also that mysterious hero Coccinelle that filled in for Ladybug for a few days, but he hasn’t heard about her since.

Clair returned with a multivitamin and an extra vitamin C, she went over Adrien’s and Emile’s schedules for the day. It was then that it finally hit him. Until Plagg was healed, however long that would take, Adrien was no longer a superhero, he was just a civilian with no way to escape his life. No akumas to break up his day, no night time patrols, or meeting up with his hero friends. His schedule was filled up with tutors throughout the day, and a fitting for his next photo-shoot in the middle of the tutors. The only things in his civilian life he has to look forward to is fencing with Kagami in the afternoon and his Chinese lessons with Master Fu after that. As Adrien walks back to his room, he looks around at his huge mansion, and all he can think about is how it’s too small, too constricting, too hard to breath. Why didn’t he push harder to get into school? He had run away to join Chloe’s class, but he helped Master Fu causing him to be caught. When he was returned home, he found his mother crying, asking why her love for him wasn’t enough to keep him happy. Her tears, that was what broke his will and made him give up going to school, maybe he would have tried again later, but that was also the day he became a superhero and met his Lady. He finally had some form of freedom, and had made his second friend/love of his life.


	2. Ice Cream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After their fencing lessons, Adrien and Kagami get some Andre's ice cream, and meet some new people there.

Once the rest of the fencing team had changed out of their uniforms and left the locker room, Kagami walks up to the only other person left in the room, “Hey Adrien, you put up a good fight today.”

  
Adrien smiles, “Thanks Kagami.”

  
“You seemed aggressive today, you usually hold back a bit more.”

  
Adrien sighs, “Yeah, just feeling like I needed to burn some extra energy. Without Plagg, I’m going to be stuck at home or at photoshoots for the foreseeable future. How are you and Longg doing?”

  
“Longg-sama hasn’t woken up yet either. As for myself, I’m in basically the same situation that you’re in, living my old life before having the freedom of becoming a hero.” Kagami pulls out a small box with the guardian symbol on it, and hands it to Adrien, who puts it in his bag.

  
Adrien frowns before smiling, “Speaking of freedom, I have a little bit of time before my Chinese lessons, do you have time to grab some ice-cream? I can have my driver drop you off afterwards.”

  
Kagami gives Adrien an awkward smile, “I was thinking the same thing, I already received approval from mother.”

  
“Huh? I guess you know me too well.”

  
“As one of my two friends, I would hope so.”

  
“Oh? You made another one?”

  
“Yeah, don’t you remember her? We won the friendship day contest together.”

  
“That’s great! I obviously remember you winning, and friendship day sounded like a really cool idea, but I wasn’t sure how many people would stay friends afterwards.”

  
“Yeah, I’ve seen her a few times after that, it’s a bit easier since she actually goes to this school…” Kagami frowns, “or, well, she at least used to go to school here.”

  
“What do you mean?”

  
“I’m not really sure. When she explained it, she was talking too fast, but the gist is that she and two other friends got expelled for some confusing reason, but basically, she says they were framed, and weren’t allowed to defend themselves.”

  
“Wow, isn’t there supposed to be trial or something?”

  
“I don’t know, no one has ever tried to get me expelled before.”

  
“Valid. Why don’t you invite her?”

* * *

Due to social media, it was pretty easy to find where Andre’s Ice Cream cart was. There was only a short line, so they waited in the car for a few minutes for Marinette and her friends to show up. A buzz from Kagami’s phone told them that it was time to get ice cream.

  
“They’re here.”

  
Adrien opens the car door, gets out, and then helps Kagami out like a proper gentleman.

  
“Thank you, Adrien.”

  
Adrien looks around, before realizing he doesn’t actually know who he’s looking for, “Where are they?”

  
Kagami scans the area, “Over there, on the other side of the ice cream cart.”

  
“Great, let’s go.”

  
As they reach the ice cream cart, Adrien realizes that both girls and the guy all look familiar.

  
One of the girls waves at them, “Hey Kagami!”

  
Kagami waves, “Hi Mari-chan!”

  
“This is my BBF Alya, and this my close friend, Max.”

  
“Hi, Alya, Marinette has told me a bit about you, and I recognize you from the Ladyblog. Thank you for your hard work, it keeps me well informed. Is Max your boyfriend?”

  
“No, Nino’s at home watching his brother. Max, Marinette, and I have been working on a project together.”

  
“Hi, my name is Max Kante. Marinette tells me that you are an excellent fencer. According to the numbers, you have a 93.753% chance of winning a gold medal in the Olympics, should you decide to enter when you’re older. Oh, and this is my friend Markov, I made him.” Max smiles as Markov flies out of his bag.

  
“Greetings, Kagami-sama. I have reviewed some videos of you fencing, and I’m curious how you can calculate the optimal move so quickly.”

  
Adrien looks at Markov, and recognizes him as akuma, Robostus. That’s when it clicks for him, they’re all from that akuma class that Chloe is in and they were all akumatized at one point or another, Gamer, Lady Wi-fi, and Princess Justice. Princess Justice, er, Marinette, was the one of the hardest akumas he had to face, and she was the reason that Master Fu decided to reveal himself and had them choose more heroes. That was also the first fight that Coccinelle subbed in for Ladybug, which threw of their coordination against Princess Justice.

  
Kagami broke Adrien’s thoughts, “With enough training, muscle memory kicks in and handles the quick reflexes, though the more important part is the planning and honing my instincts.”

  
Markov nods sagely, “Thank you for that information. Max, can I have muscle memory and instincts installed?”

  
Marinette giggles, “Markov, you don’t have muscles.”

  
“Max, can I have some muscles installed as well?” At that the group breaks out in laughter. Markov displays question marks on his screen, “What’s so funny?”

  
Once they finish laughing, Kagami speaks up, “Forgive my rudeness, but I haven’t introduced my friend yet, this is Adrien Agreste.”

  
Adrien is surprised by the other’s sudden shift in appearance, all three of them narrow their eyes at him, while Alya looks like she’s ready to fight.

  
Marinette puts on an awkward smile, like someone who’s trying to model for the first time, and puts her hand out, “Hi, Adrien, it’s nice to meet you.”

  
Adrien shakes her hand, “It’s nice to meet you too, Marinette, Alya, Max, and Markov.”

  
Markov bobs in the air in excitement, “Thank you for including me, too many adults fail to treat me as a separate being from Max.”

  
“You’re welcome Markov. Not to bring up a sore subject, but if you were sentient enough to be akumatized, then you must be sentient enough to be considered to be alive.”

  
Max adjusts his glasses, “I keep telling my teachers that, but most of them won’t listen.”

  
Marinette nods, “Right! Now, that we’ve been introduced, shall we get ice cream?”

  
“You know it!”

  
“Affirmative!”

  
“I agree, Mari-chan.”

  
“I can already see why you’re friends with Kagami.”

  
They walk up to Andre. “Ah, Alya, where is Nino today?”

  
“He had to babysit his brother today.”

  
“Aw, that’s a shame. Here’s something to remind you of your love for each other. Coconut, Banana, and a touch of passion fruit.”

  
“Thanks!” Alya takes her ice cream and pays.

  
Next in line is Marinette. “Now, you young lady. Hm, let’s see what your heart says.”

  
Marinette shakes her head, “Oh, no, I don’t love anybody yet.”

  
“Even if you say that, it doesn’t make it true. Peach pink like his lips, and mint like his eyes. Eat this, my dear, and your love will materialize.”

  
“Um, Thank you.”

  
Alya, nudges Marinette and wiggles her eyebrow, “Peach pink lips and mint eyes? Does that remind you of a certain superhero?”

  
Marinette rolls her eyes, “Alya, I keep telling you I don’t have a crush on Chat Noir.”

  
Only Kagami notices Adrien’s blush.

  
“Oh, I didn’t mention Chat Noir, but out of all of the superheroes, why did you think I was talking about him?”

  
Marinette groans, “Because you’re always insisting that I have a crush on him. Don’t most people have peach pink lips?”

  
Kagami adds in, “True, and Adrien has mint green eyes, maybe he’s your soulmate.”

  
Marinette groans again, while Alya cackles.

  
Max is up next, and Andre gives him an appraising look. “Hm, you haven’t met your true love yet, but don’t despair, for now love yourself with chocolate chip cookie dough topped off with a small scoop of pear.”

  
“Thank you, Andre.”

  
Kagami is up next. “Peach pink like his lips and pistachio green for his hair. Eat this, for your hearts will drum together in rhythm like a snare.”

  
Adrien smirks and whispers into Kagami’s ear, “Pistachio green hair? Does someone have a crush on Viperion?”

  
Marinette smirks, “See Alya, I told you most people have peach pink lips.”

  
Alya shakes her head, “So Kagami, who’s the boy, or girl, that you like?”

  
Kagami stares blankly at Alya, “Um, I don’t know. I’ve met someone with green hair a couple of times, but I never learned his name.”

  
“Do you like him?”

  
“He seems agreeable, and he does know how to play music, which makes sense with Andre talking about drums.”

  
“Hm, you should learn more about him the next time you get a chance.”

  
“Maybe I will.”

  
Andre begins to scoop Adrien’s ice cream, “Last but not least. Strawberry with black chocolate chip, blackberries for her hair, blueberry ice cream, just like her sky-blue stare.”

  
Marinette’s breath hitches.

  
Alya smirks, “Oh, those colors sound like Ladybug to me.”

  
Marinette rolls her eyes, “As the Ladyblogger, I think you’ve just got Ladybug on the brain.”

  
Alya shakes her head, “Girl, girl, girl, you try too much to deny love.”

  
“I’m not denying anything, has Adrien even met Ladybug before?”

  
Adrien finishes a bite of his ice cream, “She’s saved me a few times, but I’ve never really had a chance to actually talk to her.”

* * *

After they finished their ice cream, Adrien has Gorilla drive them to Kagami’s house to drop her off, and then he was brought back home for his Chinese lesson with Master Fu. Fu brought a little mat to kneel on, a pillow for the kwamis, and a gong. He spent most of the lesson teaching Adrien how to heal kwamis. Gorilla opened the door at the sound of the gong, but he left after Fu explained how he was teaching Adrien some Chinese customs, which Gorilla didn’t question (not that he ever talks anyway), and left them alone for the rest of the lesson. Normally, both Plagg and Longg would have been fully healed by the time the lesson was over, but this was no ordinary situation. Once the lesson was over, Master Fu took Plagg and Longg with him.

  
Even though he felt alone before, and knew that he’d be stuck in his civilian life for at least a little while, now that Fu and Plagg were really gone, it finally hit him, and it was devastating. Adrien went to sleep that night crying into his pillow, and woke up in the next morning escaping nightmares.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't find a natural place to put it in the chapter, but Kagami was able to figure out Chat Noir's identity, because she knew that Chat chose her, and adding that with his fencing style that he sometimes uses, and that she only had one friend, it made sense to her. In the original universe, she saw Marinette and Ladybug as different people, and didn't think she had the type of relationship with Marinette where Marinette would choose her, so she assumed that Ladybug chose her due to her fighting skills and honor.


	3. Athanase

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a few days of only having the Super Friends chat to keep him sane, Adrien is finally able to visit one of his friends... or at least that was the plan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This will probably be the darkest chapter of the story. When the akumas do return, I won't be going into graphic details as to what happens, but this chapter explains some ways how the new villain is worse than Hawkmoth.  
> Trigger Warning: Discussions of Rape  
> Trigger Warning: Discussions of kidnappings by the government  
> Trigger warning: Discussions of why suicidal people don't have akumatized

Super Friends

The Dozen Mousketeers: (Mylene/Souris, part time Mouse hero): Is it wrong that I had the best sleep last night in a long time? Or should I feel guiltier because I was only able to sleep so well because I know Nooroo is sick

I’m not a Cow (Ivan/Big Blue, part time Ox hero): Why? Most night akumas don’t get the whole city and we don’t get called on very often

Neither seen nor heard (Juleka/Tigress, temporary Tiger hero): That’s true Not Cow, but I think she’s referring to the fact that several night akumas have been rapists

Neither seen nor heard: I share a room with my brother, but even then, I feel like I’m always on guard while I sleep

Foxy (Alya/Rena Rouge, full time Fox hero): Yeah, those guys are the worst

Foxy: Not only do they use their powers to rape people, but their victims are seriously prone to becoming akumatized themselves, and they’ve ended up been the most fucked up akumas we’ve seen

Judy Hops (Alix/Bunnix, future Bunny hero): I know it’s fucked up, but I cheered when I heard that the deakumatized Love Master was hit by that bus while trying to escape the police

I’m not a Cow: I see

I’m not a Cow: I guess this is like the meaning of male privilege or something

I’m not a Cow: Mousketeer, you should enjoy your sleep while you can

I’m not a Cow: I’m kind of wishing I could tell my girlfriend so she can sleep better for the next few days, but I don’t know how to explain it to her without giving my identity away

Stop calling me a Bronie (Max/Pegasus, full time Horse hero): Statically, 68.9189189% of the criminals that get akumatized are akumatized because they were just arrested or were in the process of getting arrested. Should we talk to the police? Maybe they can tranquilize the criminals until they’ve been taken outside of Lycaena’s range.

Lady in spots (Marinette/Ladybug): I’ve already talked to the police about that, but according to French laws, it would violate the criminal’s rights, and if they have a decent lawyer, they could be released instead of serving their time

The Chat’s Meow (Adrien/Chat Noir): Wait, does that mean the criminals have more rights than their victims?

Not Kermit’s Wife (Rose/Princess Pig, part time Pig hero): What do you mean?

The Chat’s Meow: There was an akuma a couple weeks ago, she was upset because she couldn’t find her daughter. It turns out the daughter was raped, and when the police came, they drugged her, and took her to a hospital outside of the city. Apparently, victims are kept out of the city until doctors say they’re mentally stable enough to return.

TMNT (Nino/Carapace, full time Turtle hero): Dude, that’s fucked up

TMNT: Why didn’t they tell the family?

The Chat’s Meow: I don’t know if they just don’t bother informing anyone, or if they had trouble tracking down this one girl’s family.

Donkey Kong (Kim/King Monkey, full time Monkey hero): If my girlfriend went missing like that I’d freak out probably enough to get akumatized

Nope Rope (Luka/Viperion, full time Snake hero): Yeah, same if my sister or mom went missing

Nope Rope: Whose idea was this?

Lady in spots: I don’t know, but the Mayor was the one that signed it into city law

Cock-a-doodle (Nathaniel/Hahn, part time Rooster hero): Why is this the first I’m hearing about this law? Shouldn’t there more outrage over this?

Lizard Queen (Kagami/Ryoko, full time Dragon hero): The Mayor seems to be very efficient at managing the news.

Foxy: Yeah, I’ve been looking into the Mayor and Government for possible connections to Lycaena, and the shit they get away with that’s never reported is out of control

* * *

It’s been a couple days since been able to see anyone outside of the mansion or a photoshoot. The only thing keeping him connected to the outside world was chatting with his super friends, but that often steered to depressing topics. Thankfully, Adrien was able to change things up today, and was excited to finally spend some time with Chloe. For some reason, the traffic today was at a walking pace, so Gorilla let Adrien walk outside, as long as he stayed next to the car, and wore a disguise, well, as much as a hat and sunglasses is a disguise. It’s utterly ridiculous, but at least he has a chance to stretch his legs.

As he approaches Le Grand Paris, Adrien finally sees the source of the traffic. A whole bunch of reporters are crowding around the hotel for some reason. Across the street Adrien notices that girl in pigtails he met the other day, wearing a smirk that doesn’t look right on her. Remembering that she had an odd reaction when he was introduced to her, and the fact that he’s already wearing a disguise, he might as well pretend to be someone else and find out what’s going on.

Adrien reaches his hand out, “Hi, I’m Athanase. Do you know what’s going on here?”

The girl takes his hand and shakes it, “Hi, I’m Marinette. Evidence of the Mayor’s corruption was just released to the press in Paris, in France, and even outside of France. There’s no way he’s going to hide it under the rug this time.”

“Corruption?”

“Yeah. Mostly bribery, blackmail, and money laundering.”

“You look pretty happy about this.”

“Him and his family have hurt a lot of people.”

“You know, even if he hurt you, enjoying his pain is wrong. Revenge is wrong.”

“It’s not revenge, it’s Justice. Besides, Paris will be safer with a new Mayor.”

‘ _Oh, right, Princess Justice._ ’

“Yes, I was Princess Justice…”

‘ _Crap, I thought that out loud._ ’

“But I refuse to be akumatized again. I found out that people are only akumatized if they can’t figure out a solution to their problem, so I’ve decided to correct any injustice I come across.”

“Really? You can’t be akumatized if you have a solution to your problem?”

“Yeah, as long as you have a solution that doesn’t involve being akumatized at least. I’ve been able to fend off two akumas that way. You probably haven’t noticed, but Lycaena hasn’t akumatized anyone that is suicidal.”

“Really? Why’s that?”

“Because as messed up as it is, suicide is a solution to a person’s problems, a really bad solution.”

“How did you figure that out?”

“My best friend is the Ladyblogger, we’ve been looking into patterns with akumas.”

“I see.” Adrien looks back at the reporters hounding the hotel. “The Mayor has a daughter our age, this must be very hard for her.”

Adrien’s caught off guard by the bite in Marinette’s voice, “She deserves worse.”

“What do you mean, it’s not her fault that her father bribed and blackmailed people.”

“Actually, some of it is her fault. She’s been bullying her classmates for years, and she uses her father to blackmail the school staff to keep her out of trouble. In fact, that’s the reason why she’s caused more akumas than anyone else, because no one can stand up to her without getting punished.”

“Really? I was aware she’s caused a few akumas, but she probably has a few redeeming qualities that you don’t know about, like a cactus, prickly on the outside but good drinking water on the inside.”

Marinette glares at Adrien, “She has no redeeming qualities.”

Adrien thinks for a bit before responding, “Didn’t she design that feather Derby hat that ended up being used in a fashion show? She must have worked hard to something like that.”

Marinette bristles at that, and replies is a stern, but even voice, “No, she didn’t work hard, she stole the design from me and hired someone else to make it. And you know what’s worse, when we both presented the same hat in the contest, YOUR mother...” Adrien gasps realizing he was figured out, “refused to let me prove that it was my design, and she blacklisted me from all of the design houses based on theft. I spent years learning how to design and create outfits after I was inspired by YOUR father’s work, but all of that was thrown away because of Chloe, and Chloe wasn’t even ashamed. Afterwards she continued to mock me until I was akumatized into Princess Justice. So no, I won’t feel bad for Chloe or her family. As I said before, Paris will be safer without them in power.”

“I’m sorry, I never knew she did that.” After a brief pause, “Did you say you had a way to prove it was your design?”

“Yeah. Do you still have access to the derby hat?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“If you turn it upside down, and look at the gold lines, you’ll see that it’s actually my name, Marinette.”

“Ok, I’ll check it out and see what I can do.”

Marinette gives him a half-hearted smile, “Thank you, but I know better than to expect much.”

Adrien rubs the back of his neck shyly, “So, um, how did you figure out who I was?”

“Well, your disguise isn’t all that good, and add in the fact that you called yourself Athanase, which is your fifth name, well, it wasn’t too hard to start to connect the dots.”

“You know my fifth name? Does that mean you’re one of my fans?”

“Pfft, nope! I’m not interested in the models, only the clothing. Alya was making fun of me the other day for not recognizing you sooner. I only know so much about you, because I’ve decided to know everything about my enemies.”

Adrien’s jaw drops, “Wait, we’re enemies?”

“Not you, Chloe is one of my enemies, and you’re friends with her.” Marinette looks like she wants to say more, but doesn’t.

“I’m sorry about Chloe. I never knew she was so bad.”

“Her behavior isn’t your fault, it’s only her's and her parent's fault for enabling it.”

Adrien’s phone buzzes and after looking at it he sighs, “Chloe’s wondering where I am, I’ll see you later.”

Marinette rolls her eyes, “Sure, bye.”

* * *

It took a couple days to get his hand of the feathered derby hat, and sure enough, the gold lines spelled out Marinette’s name. ‘ _This should be enough to undo her blacklisting._ ’

It was time for dinner, so Adrien walked into the dining hall with the derby hat in hand, “Good evening, Mother”

“Good evening, Adrien.” Emilie looks up from her tablet to see Adrien holding the hat, “Why did you bring that hat in here? It could get stained.”

“I was looking over Chloe’s handiwork, and when I turned it upside-down…” Adrien turns the hat upside down, and shows off Marinette’s name, “the gold stitching spells out ‘Marinette’. I don’t think Chloe made this hat.”

“Maybe, maybe not, but it’s too late to do anything about it now.”

“What do you mean? I looked Marinette up, she was akumatized that day, and she’s been blacklisted from the fashion industry.”

“What’s done is done, we can’t fix the past.”

“No, but we can fix the present.”

“True, but the cost is steep. Having taking over for your Father, a lot of people don’t think I’m capable of running the design team. If I admit to a mistake like this, it could damage the company, and it’ll hurt a lot of employees. Not to mention the fact that this hat is what has allowed Chloe and Audrey to finally bond together. Andre is in trouble over this non-sense scandal, and if he can’t fix thing, Chloe might not have a choice but to distance herself from her father, and if we announce that Chloe stole this design, she might lose her mother too. Would you want that for Chloe? To lose both of her parents at the same time, just so this Marinette girl can continue designing, when she still has time to choose a different career?”

“No Mother, but…”

“Adrien, what’s done is done. Now eat your dinner before it gets cold.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter should be the last backstory chapter to resolve the differences of this AU against the show.
> 
> Can you guess who's idea it was to abduct rape victims out of the city?  
> I'm thinking violent criminals and victims of violent attacks both make really strong akumas, but for various reasons, Lycaena has trouble controlling rape victims, so she's not confident she'd be able to properly retrieve the miraculous from them, and because of their strong emotions, they attract all of the akumas, meaning they need to leave the city. Overall, she's fine with the acts of violent criminals, because they add a layer of negative emotions throughout the city, making it easier to akumatize more people.


	4. Chocolate Chip Cookie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien has an after photoshoot craving, and runs into a familiar face, again.

Another morning photoshoot, and it was also another photoshoot with Lila Rossi. Why would Chloe be friends with this girl, and why would his mother follow Chloe’s suggestion to have Lila be his model buddy, was, well, beyond him. She was way too clingy and touchy, wasn’t that the whole reason he had a bodyguard in the first place? Besides that, she was constantly arguing with the staff, acting like she knew better, and was better than them, which of course caused the photoshoots to be constantly delayed. At least she hasn’t really tried to kiss him yet, well, she did try, but Adrien was able to dodge. Adrien is homeschooled, but doesn’t Lila have school? Isn’t that how she knows Chloe?

As he was being driven home, he opened the car window to look outside while listening too and smelling his city. Ok, not all of the city smelled great, but it was alive, and right now, it smelled like, ‘ _Oh, is that butter? Sugar? Chocolate Chip Cookies?_ ’ Adrien’s stomach grumbled, remembering that since it was a photoshoot, he had a light breakfast, and now that he’s near a bakery, he can fix that issue. Thankfully Adrien’s next tutor was rescheduled because of the delays, leaving Adrien with a few spare minutes before he had to get home, and it’s probably in between the breakfast rush and the lunch rush, not that Adrien actually knows when those are, but looking through the windows, there doesn’t seem to be a long line.

“Hey, could we turn around and get a snack at this bakery?”

The Gorilla grunts, makes a U-turn, and parks next to the bakery.

“It looks empty, so I should be safe by myself, would you like me to get you something?”

The Gorilla grunts in agreement.

Adrien gets out of a car and enters the bakery. At the counter he sees what is becoming a now familiar face. Adrien waves shyly, “Hi Marinette. Um, what are you doing here?”

Marinette puts on her customer service smile, “I’m working the counter. My parents own this bakery, and I’m covering for them while they have an early lunch. What are you doing here?”

“Oh, um, I just finished a photoshoot, and I wanted a snack before I got home. But, um, yeah, I could tell you’re working here, I meant, aren’t people our age usually at school right now?”

Marinette frowns, “Yeah, most of them are, and I would be too if your girlfriend didn’t frame me and get me expelled.”

“What? I don’t have a girlfriend. Who are you talking about?”

Marinette tilts her head in a mock questioning look, “Oh? Your model buddy, Lila Rossi. She’s been telling everyone at Dupont that the two of you are dating.”

Adrien makes a face in disgust, “And everyone believes her?”

“Well, most people at school knows she’s a liar, but Chloe and Sabrina have backed her up on this. Haven’t you noticed the increase of your fan girls getting akumatized recently? It’s half because they think you’re taken, and half because they just hate Lila.”

Adrien sighs, “I’m going to have to talk to Chloe, get her to stop helping Lila. Me being single is good for the brand, maybe I can use this to get my Mother to stop having me model with Lila.”

Marinette frowns at that, ‘ _Why does he need a reason other than he doesn’t like modeling with her?_ ’

“What did she do to get you expelled, and why?”

“The why is simple, because she’s part of the Trio of Terror with Chloe and Sabrina, and Chloe hates me… that’s why. She also got Max expelled, and he was the smartest kid in school, you met his robot Markov, so you know how smart he is. With him gone, Sabrina now has the best grades in school. And lastly, Alya was also expelled, because Lila hates Alya for exposing her as the Liar she is.”

“What happened?”

“When Lila first came to our school, she was making all of these ridiculous claims about knowing famous people. She got Alya to interview her, where she claimed to be Ladybug’s BFF.”

Adrien blanched at that.

“Right? Chat Noir is Ladybug’s BFF. So anyway, Alya tracked down Ladybug and asked her if it was true, and Ladybug said ‘No.’, so Alya told everyone, and everyone realized Lila was a liar. That was the first time Lila was akumatized. After that, Lila tried to skip school, but after a couple of days, the school tracked down her mother, who brought her back, and Lila was akumatized again. Lila still lies all of the time, but she’s stopped pretending to be an angle, and instead joined up with Chloe and Sabrina to terrorize the rest of us.” (A/N: By the time Lila joined the school, Marinette had already been akumatized to Princess Justice, which led to Alya learning Ladybug’s identity and subbing in as Coccinelle, and therefore, she knew that she was in fact Ladybug’s BFF Thank You Very Much!)

“So, she hates Alya for calling out her lies?”

“Yeah, she even hates Ladybug for honestly answering Alya’s question.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah. There’s something really wrong with her. The how is because she was akumatized into Chameleon, and pretended to be me, stealing stuff, cursing off the teachers, sexually assaulting students, and even threated to push someone down the stairs. She was smart enough to not do any lasting physical damage, so there was nothing for the Ladybug cure to fix. She did the same thing to get Alya and Max expelled.”

“And you three were expelled, just like that?”

“Basically. Our parents tried to fight it, and we even tracked Ladybug down who talked to the principle and explained that it was Lila as an akuma, but there wasn’t any other proof that she was an akuma, while the Trio had recorded everything, and apparently sent it to all of the parents. Supposedly, a few of them said they didn’t feel safe with us in the same school as their kids, so the principle said he had no choice. Though, it might have just been Chloe who used her daddy’s the mayor card to make sure we stayed expelled.”

‘ _I don’t remember Lila getting akumatized other than when she first joined the class. How many battles have I missed without knowing it?_ ’ “Wow. What about going to a new school?”

Marinette shakes her head, “We probably could get into one, not a very good one with our expullsion, but we’ve decided to home school for now while we clear our names. If we don’t, this could very well get in our way from getting into a good university.”

“Oh, right. How do you plan to clear your names?”

“Well, you’ve already seen the first step, exposing the Mayor. Calls for a new election are already trending, with him out of power, and Chloe unable to boss around the teachers and Principal, it’ll help a lot. Proving that it was Lila as Chameleon, will be a little bit trickery. Ladybug said next time Lila is akumatized, she’ll make sure she records the fight and deakumatization, and then give a statement to other times Lila was akumatized. If the principal doesn’t let us back in, we’ll take the evidence to the school board, but we have to wait for a few of them to be fired first, since they’re part of the mayor’s corruption scandal.”

Remembering his sick kwami, “What if Lila doesn’t get akumatized again?”

“She will. The last couple of times she was akumatized, nothing even happened to make her upset, but there was someone else nearby that she caused to be upset and being calmed down. We’ve been wondering if she’s been purposely akumatizing herself. If we catch her in the act, I think it’ll help a lot.”

A car horn honks from outside.

“Shoot, I have to hurry up. What’s good here? I promised to get something for my bodyguard as well.”

“Oh, well, the croissants and chocolate chip cookies are a classic, but our Macarons are rated the best in Paris.”

“Great, I’ll have two of each, er well, those macarons are small, are all macarons so small? I’ve never had one before. How about two croissants, two chocolate chip cookies, and four macarons.”

Marinette gets out a box and starts packing them up.

As he watches her, he remembers the last conversation they had, “Oh, Marinette, I’m sorry, but showed the derby hat to my mother, she said it was too late to fix things. Something about the staff at the company will lose faith in her, and everything will fall apart.”

Marinette rings up the price on the register, and Adrien hands her some cash. “Thanks for trying Adrien. Though, that’s what I expected; the corrupt always have excuses.” Marinette hands him back his change.

Adrien looks at Marinette, caught off guard by the accusation, “My Mother isn’t corrupt.”

Marinette gives Adrien a half-hearted smile, “We all want to think the best about the people we love, but nobody is perfect.”

Adrien turns around and heads to the door.

“Oh, Adrien! You just had a photoshoot with Lila, right? When did it finish, and where was it?”

Adrien turns around to look at her, “Why?”

Marinette smirks, “Because odds are Lila will lie about that, and skip more classes than she should. I want to give my teacher accurate information for her to work with.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Marinette wouldn't have told a normal person she barely knows these plans, but she decided to be open about them to work on gaining Adrien's trust, gauge his reactions, and hopefully open his eyes to reality. She might be acting a bit manipulative in her own way, but she believes it's in his best interest. The other option to just burn him when she burns her enemies, but she doesn't want innocent casualties.


	5. Underwear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien manages to get out of the house again, this time for another Photoshoot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Only two days behind schedule! Day 6's prompt was giving me some trouble when there's no kwami in the story atm, so I wasn't sure how I wanted to end the chapter.

It was that time again, yup, another photoshoot, woopeeeeee. Adrien was in his dressing trailer, when he hears a knock on the door, “Who is it?”

“Hi, I’m MDC. I was hoping to see how my outfit fits on you before the photoshoot.”

“Oh, sure, come in.”

Adrien was facing his clothing rack, reaching for the outfit in question when he hears the door open, a sudden squeak, and then the door slamming shut. “Huh?” Adrien turns around to find himself alone in the room. “What happened? Are you ok?”

“Un-un-underwear!”

Adrien looks down to see that he’s only wearing his Ladybug boxers at the moment. ‘ _What’s the big deal?_ ’ “Are you saying that you’re not a fan of Ladybug?”

“What? No, of course I’m a fan. She’s a superhero! How could I not be a fan? Are you a fan of Ladybug? No, wait, of course you are, you’re wearing her underwear… I mean, not her actual underwear, just men’s underwear inspired by her. Though, if you were wearing women’s underwear, I wouldn’t judge you, but if they were actually hers, then you probably stole them, and that’d be creepy, but you didn’t, so you’re not creepy. Eveything’s good. Everything’s good.”

“Um, ok.”

“Is, is, um, are you wearing the outfit yet?”

“I’m putting it on now. You can come inside if you want, it’ll be easier to talk.”

“No, no. You’re changing, I can wait until you have clothes on.”

“Oh, is that’s what was bothering you? I don’t mind if you see me in my underwear, I’m used to it.”

“What? But, but, you’re a teenager, that’s not something you should be used it.”

“It’s fine, I’ve been modelling since I was a boy. It’s part of the life of being a model, I guess.” Adrien finished getting dressed in awkward silence. “Ok, I’m dressed, you can come in now.”

The door opened up, and a head skittishly peaked inside before the rest of the body followed. MDC had beautiful shoulder length dark raven hair, and covering her face a Chat Noir styled facemask, which made her Bluebell eyes pop out. She was wearing a business style suit jacket and pants, both were black, but the seams were in Chat Noir’s green. On the inside of the jacket, he could see that it was orange at the top, and towards the bottom it faded to white, and all throughout it were black and red polka dots. Her shirt was a much or casual T-shirt, and it pictures the zodiac animals all safely inside a turtle shell while a swarm of Bees try and sting the shell. Somehow her outfit represented all of the heroes, even some that haven’t been publicly seen yet.

“Hi, so, you’re the MDC I’ve been hearing about?”

“Yup, that’s meee.”

“Do you always wear a mask?”

“Oh, yes, I mean, no. I usually don’t wear a mask, but since I’m out in public as MDC, and Jagged Stone kind of made MDC famous, I’m hiding my identity so I can keep my privacy for my normal day to day life.”

“Oh, so you’re like a superhero.”

“What? No, I’m not a superhero.”

“No, I meant, like you have a secret identity.”

“Oh, right, yeah, just like that. So, um, can you go through some poses so I can see how the outfit fits?”

“Oh, right.” Adrien starts going through his standard poses while MDC, “So, doesn’t anyone know your secret identity?”

“You mean besides Jagged Stone? There are my parents, and now HR at Gabriel. They had to sign an NDA to not reveal my identity when they did my background check. They can’t even tell you or your mother my identity.”

“Really?”

“Yup, Jagged’s manager is very effective. Though it did put things behind schedule a bit. I’m sorry we’re doing this fitting so late.”

Adrien does his final pose, “That’s ok, it feels like it fits very well on me.”

“Great, because it looks good on you too. Ok, I’ll let you relax or whatever it is you do while waiting for the shoot to start.”

Marinette leaves the room, and cackling rings in her ear through her headpiece hidden in her hair. Alya’s voice speaks in her ear, “Agent DC, that was hilarious. I haven’t seen you so flustered since you met Luka. Sooo, what was it, Adrien’s muscular back, or the fact that he was wearing your colors to cover his junk?”

Now it’s Max’s voice, “Don’t respond to that. Agent C, don’t distract her, we didn’t go through the trouble of setting up a fake identity so she could get around her blacklist just to be caught now. Just a warning, I’ve spotted Lila on the cameras, and you’ll be able to see her, right about, now.”

* * *

“No, no, no, that’s not my mama’s spaghetti.”

Marinette wants to scream. Is that all the adults have to say when Lila is clearly sexually harassing and assaulting Adrien, who is clearly uncomfortable of all of her touching and comments. This whole shoot has taken twice as long as it should have. MDC covers her mouth with her and, and whispers into her hidden mic, “Hey, can one of you two call me on my phone?” After a second, her phone starts to ring. “Oh, sorry.” MDC turns away from the models, as she answers her phone, and speaks loud enough for everyone to hear, “Hey, sorry, things are running behind schedule. No, no, the outfit was fine, it’s just this amateur Lily girl that they modeling with Adrien. Can you figure out her name and blacklist her from my projects? Thanks, I don’t know why she hasn’t been fired yet. I’ll call you when the shoots over.” MDC hangs up her phone, and turns back to the group, to see Lila scowling at her, and Adrien smiling. “Sorry if that interrupted anything. My manager was just worried that she hadn’t hear from me.”

After that, the rest of thee crew felt emboldened and stopped putting up with Lila’s BS. The shoot still took longer than it needed to, but it was a little improvement.

* * *

After the photoshoot, MDC was waiting for Adrien to change so she could pick up the outfit.

Max’s voice is in her ear again, “I think Lila’s about to throw a water bottle at you. She’s at the snack table behind you.”

Marinette whispers, “Thanks Max, if it’s just a water bottle, I’ll let her hit me. If nothing else, we’ll have an assault recorded on camera to use against… ow!” The water bottle hits MDC in the back of her head, causing the strap of her mask to become undone, and it falls to the ground. She quickly picks it up and holds it over her face, and then takes a look around, luckily there was no one to see her.

“Lila is hiding behind some equipment, and she couldn’t have seen your face from that angle. We should improve the mask so it stays on better in the future.”

“Yeah, maybe I should use an adhesive and a strap. In fact, I can set the strap to fall off if someone tries to pull it too hard, and it’ll really be the glue holding the mask on. So you got all of that on video?”

“Yeah, it’s already saved. What do you want to do with it?”

“Let’s hold onto it for now. I don’t want her to know that she’s being watched… yet.” MDC holds the mask to her face as she walks over to Adrien’s changing room and knocks, “Hey Adrien, it’s MDC again, I’m here to pick up the outfit.”

“Ok, come in!”

“Do you have clothes on this time?”

“Yes, I’ve already changed back into my regular clothes.”

“Great!” MDC opens the door and peaks inside to confirm, and yes, he’s wearing clothes this time. She enters the room and turns away from him, “Hey, could you tie my mask back on?”

“Sure.” Adrien grabs both straps and pulls them together. As he’s tying them, his hands brushes her hair, “Hey, why’s your hair cold and wet?”

“That girl threw a water bottle at the back of my head.”

“Really? Which girl?”

“The one you were modeling with.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault. In fact, you’re more of a victim of hers than I am.”

“What? She didn’t hit me.”

“No, but she was sexually harassing you and I’d say it went as far as calling it sexual assault.”

“Boys can’t be sexually assaulted.”

“Yes they can, anyone can. Unwanted kissing, unwanted touching are both forms of it. You shouldn’t have to dodge her attempts at kissing you, and she shouldn’t have put her hand on your chest or slide her hand down. If that guy didn’t yell about spaghetti, and move her, she would have felt your man parts.”

“I know she can be a bit touchy, but we have to touch each other for the photo-shoot.”

MDC scowls, “No, you don’t. The way she was touching you was wrong, and no one should touch you in a way that you’re not comfortable with, even if it’s for a photo-shoot. You should talk to your mother, make sure you never get paired up with that girl again. And if other models and photo-shoots make you uncomfortable, maybe its best you quit. I can collect statements from the staff.”

“No, don’t! For whatever reason, Mother is insisting that Lila models with me, and as bad as that is, it’s better than not modeling.”

“What? How can you say that? You looked miserable out there.”

The desperation of Adrien’s face shocks Marinette, “The key word is ‘out’, modelling is one of the few things I do that let me get out of the house, and actually talk to people, so please, don’t interfere and get this taken away from me.”

Concern fills MDCs voice, “Adrien, are you safe at home?”

Adrien scoffs, “I’ve got the best security money can buy.”

Unsure what to do, and not wanting to push too far, MDC decides to leave things for now, “Ok, I don’t agree, but it’s your choice.” She picks up the outfit and packs it in its bag. Pulling out a card, she hands it to Adrien, “This has my contact info, if you need a friend to talk to, feel free to call.”

Adrien takes the card and puts it in his pocket. As the door closes, he collapses into his chair, taking deep breaths, trying to control his panic. “Plagg, what’s taking so long. I need you.”

* * *

On her way home, Marinette calls Penny, her Manager, and informs her of Lila’s unprofessional behavior (leaving out the sexual harassment as per Adrien’s request), and stating that she doesn’t want to work with that model again. It would have only encouraged Lila if nothing had happened after the pretend phone call earlier, and besides that, no reason to give Lila a chance to recognize her and ruin things.

Once she was done talking to Penny, she makes another phone call. “Hey Kagami, tell me everything you know about Adrien and his mother.”


	6. Unify!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien runs into MDC again, and learns a little bit about the darker side of the fashion industry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since the Kwami aren't active in the story atm to "Unify!", I decide to go over my understanding of some current events instead.

MDC’s business card was sitting on his desk, staring at him. He received it two days ago, and the idea of having a new friend was really tempting, but every time he tried to dial the number, he was filled with a foreboding unease. Something is telling him that if he makes that call, everything will change, but what everything? The sky will still be the sky, and the ground will still be the ground, so not ‘everything’ will change. She was right though, in her questioning if he was comfortable with modelling, if he’d be happier just not modelling. It’s not that he modeled because he liked modelling, he continued to do it so he could get out of the house. He still wasn’t allowed to go to school, but maybe there was something else he could do.

In the end, he put MDC’s business card away in his desk drawer. Maybe he’ll call her tomorrow.

By the time dinner came around, he can’t design, but he’s still expected to run the company someday. Clearly, there was a lot of non-design work to be done, so he requested to learn about the various parts of the business. It’s only prudent that he knows how all of this works, since he’ll need to know some day, and he could even start being productive in the near future.

Emilie wanted to turn him down, but she couldn’t come up with a valid reason to. She could think of several invalid reasons if she needed them. On the other-hand, this is the first time he’s shown more than a casual interest in the business, and if she turns him down now, he might not want the company later. She’ll have to keep an eye on him, and make sure the staff is reminded to remain professional, but it should be fine.

* * *

Emilie was giving a presentation to a few designers about the next line they were to work on. She had found a male and female outfit set from one of Gabriel’s old design books, and now it’s up to rest of the team to make more outfits that will compliment the Gabriel originals. While his mother wasn’t a designer, she has been a model since before he was born, and had a good eye for fashion. Of course, he didn’t understand everything that was being talked about, and one of the rules in their agreement was that he’d stay quite during the meeting, and can ask questions privately later. Whether the reason was that was so he didn’t embarrass himself, or to prevent the meeting from going long, he wasn’t sure.

After the meeting, the lead designer wanted to talk to Emilie about something, so Adrien took the chance to explore the office a little bit by excusing himself to go to the bathroom. While mentally mapping out the layout, he turned the corner and felt something bump into him.

“Sorry!”

“Sorry!”

Adrien looked down to see that it was MDC. “Hey, MDC, what are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be at school?”

“Oh, hi Adrien. It’s my lunch break, so I came to meet the design lead and drop off some designs for child versions of the outfit you wore for the photoshoot the other day.”

“I was curious…”

“About what?”

“You’re around my age, right? What exactly is your position here?”

“Oh, I guess it’s design intern, or something to that affect. Since I’ve made some outfits for Jagged Stone and other musicians, they’re having my design formal and casual wear in the Gabriel style, but with hints of rock and roll in them.”

“Oh, cool. What do you think of the company so far?”

“Well, there’s definitely a lot of perks to working at this company, and I’m enjoying it, but it’s also showing me the things I don’t like about working for a major design house.”

“Oh, what do you mean?”

“Well, for one thing, the company is publicly traded. Even though your family owns the majority of the stocks, if the company does something that would lower the stock price, not only would it affect your family’s worth, it could cause the company to lose leverage, hindering their talks to acquire new loans.”

“Well, isn’t it the CEO’s job to make the stock worth as much as possible? I don’t’ understand the issue.”

“Well, yes, that is the CEO’s job, but there are more important things than Monday. A lot the practices in the fashion industry are harmful to the environment. For a little extra money, better methods could be used, but that’ll cut into the profits, either directly if the prices for the outfits remain the same, or the outfits would become more expensive, making it less affordable, resulting in less sales.”

“But don’t people want things that are more environmentally friendly?”

“In theory, yes, but many people tend to care about things such as cost, style, and feel of the material more.”

“I see.”

“There’s also the issue that this company, along with most of the fashion industry others, keeps the costs down by using force labor.”

“Wait? What do you mean? Like slavery?”

“Essentially, yes.”

“But we don’t have any slaves, and you just said that this company has many perks for its employees.”

“Yes, but that’s for the people directly employed by the company. Cotton picked and processed by the Uighur people in China makes it into one of five products in the world. They don’t choose to do these jobs, they get taken away from their families to undergo ‘re-education’ and they have to work, as a way to make them lose their culture and make them more unified with the rest of China.”

“Wow, I’ve never heard about any of this. Is there anything we can do to help?”

“It’s one of those things that businesses try not to talk about, but you shouldn’t take my word for it, you should research it for yourself. As for what can be done to help, well, your family owns the company, and it’s expected that you’ll run it someday.”

“Hm, I guess I still have a lot to learn about.”

“Yeah, there’s always things we can do better, we just have to learn about what’s wrong, and what’s better to do so. I have to go now to review my designs, see you later Adrien.”

“See you later, MDC.”


	7. Oblivious

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien joins the home-school club, and video chats with them.

After Adrien was done exploring office life for the day, he met Kagami for fencing practice. After practice was over and they were done changing back, Kagami walked up to him and said, “You were more focused today.” She handed him a piece of folded note, “I have to go now, Mother insists I’m home promptly today.”

“Oh, ok, Bye.”

He opened the note and read it.

“Hi Adrien,

This is Marinette, Kagami’s friend that lives in bakery next to Dupont. I was wondering if you wanted to join Alya, Max, and myself in our Homeschool club. Some days we all meet up and work together, but other days when we’re in our separate homes, we have a day-long video call while we read textbooks and whatnot. It’s helped us stay connected, and we can ask each other questions if we don’t understand something. If you’re interested, here’s the various ways you can contact me.

Marinette ^_^

P.S.

You and Kagami should get each other’s phone number, or another way to contact each other outside of meeting up for fencing. It helps friendships grow.”

Adrien and Kagami did in fact have a way to contact each other via DMs in the superhero chat, but Ladybug and Master Fu insisted that the chat be limited to superhero work and nothing personal, though not everybody listened to that. Kagami on the other hand, only uses the chat for superhero related business.

* * *

As it turned out, because of Adrien actually having tutors, it meant that he didn’t have much time during the day that he could join the group call, but he was able to fit it in during his lunch break. Since he usually ate his lunches alone, now that his mother was busy running the business, that was a good time he could join the video call, so for the next two lunches he did that, and he learned a lot about the French education system in that time. Did you know that the lunch breaks in French schools last between 90 minutes and 2 hours? Adrien didn’t know that, because his lunch breaks were always limited to 45 minutes, that was the time between his morning subject tutor and his afternoon subject tutor.

As it turns out, Dupont was an exceptional school, academically speaking at least. As one of the top public school in Paris, entry to the school was supposedly entirely merit based, though there were a few students that seemed to have gotten in more based on money or political connections than merit. But even compared to its academic standing, Adrien was almost two years ahead of where he should be, and he went deeper into the topics than the school did. Technically, he was only two years ahead of Alya, because it turned out that both Marinette and Max had skipped a grade. Max could have skipped another grade, but his parents didn’t want him to get too far ahead, as that might hurt his social growth.

‘ _Is that something that parents are supposed to care about? It doesn’t seem like my parents got the memo._ ’

Just based on normal school hours, and how much homework students would get on an average night, it was no wonder that Adrien was ahead, since he had to put in a lot more hours than they did. That’s just counting the normal subjects. All students at Dupont had to take part of a club, student council, work-study, or some other sort of extracurricular activity. Some of the more ambitious students would do a second thing, though that was usually more informal. Several of Marinette’s friends were in a band, and would practice a lot, but since it was outside of school, and they didn’t have a proper adult supervisor, they still had to do something more related to the school itself. One of said band members would practice writing poetry and song lyrics during the art club, which counted. Of course, Fencing counted as well, but Adrien was doing Fencing, Piano, and learning Chinese as his current language, not that he’s used the other languages he’s learned yet. So, on top of him having too many class hours, too much homework, too many extracurriculars, he also had photoshoots. Even if he could get his office visits to stick, and replace some, hopefully most, of his photoshoots, he clearly had more on his plate than was expected for a teenager. Oh, right, Max’s mom was training to be an astronaut, supposed to be the best of the best, and Max thinks she’s actually studying/working less than Adrien. As Adrien unconsciously tried to play with the miraculous ring on his finger, finding that it was still bare, he was reminded that he also tended to spend a lot of time as superhero as well. Adrien always wanted more in his life, but that was more friends, more love, not more work.

Earlier in the conversation, Adrien had mentioned that he has tried to attend public school several times, but was always denied by his parents. While Adrien’s mind was swirling in bitter thoughts of his own education, it was Marinette that pulled him out by bringing back the earlier topic.

“Maybe you should use a different approach when talking about going to school. Like, maybe, how can you run a company if you don’t understand normal people? As the head of a company, you’ll end up needing to trust some people with certain things, but how will you know who to trust, and who can be trusted with what? A background check only tells you if they’ve been caught in the past, but it’s your gut instinct that’s developed over years of knowing people, for you to know if someone is trustworthy, or secretly a snake. But it’s not only that, you have to learn about and understand people to know what they can handle. Let’s say that one day the lead designer decides to leave, or gets in an accident or something, and you’ll have to promote someone else into that position. Naturally, you’ll instantly look at the best designer you have left, but what if that person isn’t leader material.”

Alya interrupted and makes a pointed expression at the camera, presumably at someone in the call, “Some people don’t delegate the work out enough, and try to do too much work on their own, causing them to be overworked. That can be fixed, but that takes time and experience to learn, so if you want someone to have that type of job, you’ll have to make sure they get that experience before you give them the job.”

Marinette rolls her eyes, “Right, and other people delegate all of the work, and don’t do anything themselves. I’m not sure how to teach people to not be lazy, especially when they think they’re already working. Then there are people that aren’t good at explaining things, which leaves everyone confused. That might be something that can be taught as well, but maybe you’ll need them to take communication classes before you give them the job. Also, how will you resolve disagreements at the office? What if two people are blaming each other for something that went wrong? Was it a miscommunication? Did someone mess up and is lying about it? Maybe someone has something major going on outside of work, and they just completely forgot about their task.”

Max adds in, “The girls are correct. Even with me attending school with my peers, and my superior intellect, I must admit I do a rather poor job at all of those tasks. When I start my company, I’m going to have to hire a people person to handle those tasks. Of course, the company will start out small, and I’ll have time to find the right person for the job. As the company grows, our trust and working relationship will undoubtedly grow as well. But for you, you’ll be taking over an already established business, and won’t be able to grow such a relationship as you grow the company.”

Adrien smiles, “Thanks guys. There are so many normal things I never knew about; you’ve given me a lot to consider. This already sounds like a good argument, but I’ll have to research the benefits of attending school verse home schooling. I’ll probably have to make it into a short essay or something. In the meantime, I’ll continue pushing to going to the office once a week to learn about the business. I have to go get ready for my next tutor. Bye!”

“Bye.”

“You know where to find us.”

“Make sure you and Kagami exchange contact info.”

“I was already planning on it at fencing today.”

“Great!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case it isn't clear, I'm rather against home schooling for a variety of reasons, but the chief among them is that it limits social growth, it makes it a lot easier to hid various forms of abuse on the child, and the child gets a very limited view on the world, all issues that has been shown to affect Adrien in the show. I believe home-schooling should be limited to very special circumstances, such as a pandemic, or someone has weak immune system and could die from a common cold or flu.
> 
> I was originally going to have the chat lead to Lila's obliviousness to her own pending doom, but I'll save that for a different chapter.


	8. Little Kitty on the Roof

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien has been feeling down, missing Plagg, and missing the ability to transform and explore the city.

It’s been three weeks since the Kwami got sick. Three weeks without being able to sneak out of his house, three weeks without seeing his lady and his other super friends. He has been able to chat with them a little bit, and he’s also chatted with the home-school club a bit, and he’s made a second trip to the Gabriel office, but it’s not the same as being a superhero. Master Fu has brought Plagg with him during the Chinese lessons, and they’ve worked together to heal Plagg, but he’s still asleep. The other Kwami have woken up and are eating, but they’re still too tired to transform. When the Kwami were asked what caused them all to get sick, their only response was to blow out bubbles. That apparently means that the stupid spell that prevents them from leaking Miraculous secrets was in effect, meaning at the very least they know what happened, not that it helps the humans figure out what happened. Every day since Plagg got sick has been harder on Adrien than the last. Plagg was a constant friend and companion for the last year and a half. Adrien had been lonely before meeting Plagg, but back then he didn’t know any better, back then he didn’t know how lonely he truly was. All of those negative thoughts and feelings have been building up for three weeks, well, actually a lot of that was building up for years, but these three weeks were the worst, and now, today, Adrien feels broken. His plan was to read the latest comic to lift up his spirits, but the story he read today did everything but lift his spirits.

Adrien was browsing through his favorite pictures of him and Ladybug, while singing his favorite comfort song that Plagg hates, “Little kitty on a roof, all alone, without his lady…”

An alert from his phone interrupts him, informing him of a message from one of his super friends.

Lady in Spots: Hey Kitty, I’m just checking in, because we haven’t had a chance to see each other in a while

Lady in Spots: and because I just read the latest Mightillustrator comic about us, and have you read it yet? If not, maybe you should skip this one

The Chat’s Meow: I got about half-way through before I stopped reading it.

The Chat’s Meow: I was really looking forward to it, but yeah, it would have been a better idea to skip it.

Lady in Spots: Oh, is it ok if I tell you the ending then? It does have a happy ending.

The Chat’s Meow: Sure.

Lady in Spots: It turned out that Mightillustrator and Reverser had managed to save Ladybug before they died, and she just needed some time to recover and plan, before she deakumatized Chat Blanc and brought back all of Paris, and the Moon

The Chat’s Meow: That’s great. At least there was a happy ending after having all of my fears shoved into my face, and at least the comic version of my akuma was incompetent enough to lose.

The Chat’s Meow: This story was worse than ‘Old Man Noir’, where I was complaining about know our grandkids faces or names because of ‘Secret Identities’. Don’t they realize they’re writing fan fics about real people?

Lady in Spots: Yeah, both those stories sucked

Lady in Spots: I wish they didn’t write them

The Chat’s Meow: Why did they? The story didn’t really fit the hopeful mood of the rest of the series.

Lady in Spots: I heard that they’ve that they have a thread on Reddit requesting akuma ideas/prompts

Lady in Spots: I think part of it was for writer to get experience incorporating other people’s ideas into his work

The Chat’s Meow: I hope Lycaena isn’t getting ideas from this thread, she’s already bad enough.

Lady in Spots: I don’t remember if I’ve said this before, but if there’s anything ever wrong, and you want to talk to somebody, I’m here for you

The Chat’s Meow: Thanks =^.^=

The Chat’s Meow: You know, I’m here for you too.

Lady in Spots: I never doubted it for a second

Lady in Spots: Besides the stupid comic, how are you doing?

The Chat’s Meow: I’m fine.

Lady in Spots: Really?

Lady in Spots: I miss Tikki a lot

The Chat’s Meow: Yeah, I miss Plagg too.

The Chat’s Meow: Didn’t realize how much he’s grown on me.

Lady in Spots: I was talking to Master

Lady in Spots: All of the other Kwami are healing a lot faster than Tikki and Plagg

Lady in Spots: The rest of the Kwami should be healed before Nooroo and Duusu

Lady in Spots: But we should be prepared in case Tikki and Plagg aren’t healed in time

Lady in Spots: Viperion has a trip coming up soon, so we were thinking maybe you should take Sass until after the trip, so you can practice his powers

Lady in Spots: And I’ll borrow a different Kwami

Lady in Spots: I know Sass is no Cheese Goblin, but having a different perspective for a couple of weeks might be good

Lady in Spots: What do you think?

The Chat’s Meow: Training to have backup wielders for each Miraculous sounds like a good idea.

The Chat’s Meow: I wouldn’t mind getting to know another Kwami.

~~The Chat’s Meow: Plagg will probably be upset, but it’s his fault for not getting healed faster.~~

Lady in Spots: Great, Master says they should be ready in a couple of days

Lady in Spots: Oh!

Lady in Spots: I talked to Master, since we don’t know what’s going on, I think we should give Bunnix her miraculous as soon as it’s healed as well.

Lady in Spots: Master agreed.

The Chat’s Meow: Yeah, that sounds good.

The Chat’s Meow: I hate this feeling, we’re just waiting for something to happen, but we have no idea what.

Adrien puts his phone down, feeling a bit better. Talking to his lady always helps. Having Sass around might make him feel less alone, though he won’t be Plagg.


	9. Emilie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emilie reflects about the people in her life as she watches over her dear Gabriel.

Emilie sat there next to Gabriel. With Nooroo and Duusu both sick, there’s been no progress in restoring her beloved. Not only does she love Gabriel, she knows that Gabriel is the only one that truly loves her. The sounds from the machines, and the various displays on the monitors shows that everything is as expected for a typical coma. Of course, it’s not a typical coma, and all of the machines were rigged so that the Gabriel’s nurse wouldn’t be suspect anything. How else could he suddenly get better one day without people concluding miracle, and have more enemies come after them, trying to steal their miraculous. As Gabriel grew weaker, they discussed the possibilities. Gabriel wanted to reverse go back and change the past, but she had heard the stories of the Genie’s lamp and the Monkey’s Paw, whether or not they were based on true stories or not, the butterfly effect was indeed real. Who knows what the consequences would be of changing the past. They both knew that using a wish would have a cost, but it was rather ambiguous as to what the cost would be, though it makes sense that it would be in proportion to the size of the wish made. It only became clear when Adrien was telling her about a show he discovered, about two boys that wanted to bring back their dead mother, and they studied some sort of magic that could alter matter. The principle behind the magic was equivalent exchange. Nothing could be created without destroying an equal and similar amount of matter. The Ladybug Miraculous creates, while the Black Cat destroys. Combining the two to make a wish means that the cost of the wish is the same as what was gained from the wish. So, to save Gabriel’s life, means that someone else would need to be sacrificed. The question is, who should be sacrificed? If she didn’t choose, then the Miraculous would probably choose for her, and probably not someone she’d be willing to sacrifice.

* * *

Everyone thinks that Gabriel was the lucky one in the marriage, that Gabriel has always been a cold ruthless man with a stick up his butt, and that she’s the Gabriel whisper. That of course, couldn’t be farther from the truth. When they first met, Gabriel had already become a bit jaded after spending seven years in the fashion industry. He constantly had to deal with people stealing credit, sabotaging his work, and his supervisors talking down to him. He learned how to secretly sign his work and sabotage his enemies, but people still messed with him, because they didn’t fear him. When they first met, she knew that Gabriel was infatuated by both her beauty and her presence. It wasn’t until after she had modeled for Gabriel for a little while, that he truly fell for her, and she remember it clearly.

Some bimbo wanted to steal her spot as top model at the company, while Emilie didn’t actually care about modelling, it was a stepping stone to her acting career, so she needed to protect it for a little while longer, and all she needed to do to secure her spot was spread a little rumor that ruined the poor girl. What she didn’t realize was that Gabriel was nearby and heard everything, then he waited to see how everything would unfold. When he pulled her aside, and told her what he knew, she figured that he wanted to get rid of her or blackmail her, so she was already plotting how to remove him first, but then he was suddenly praising her. Before he was merely intrigued by her beauty, but now that he’s seen behind the mask, he was completely enthralled. Not only that, but he was asking her to teach him how to control people with just a few words. He wanted people to fear him, to be too afraid to attempt to steal from him, and backstab him. Together, they could rule as far as the eye could see. Never before had she been so openly accepted for who she was behind the mask, and not only did he accept her, when she looked into Gabriel’s eyes, she knew that he loved her, and that was when she fell in love herself, for the first and only time.

With practice, Emilie was able to teach Gabriel to be colder, to analyze and understand people better, to see their weaknesses, and to know when to strike. Once he mastered his techniques, they created a game that they would play on their employees and lesser business partners, they called it ‘Cold Bastard CEO and his approachable, alluring, sunshine girlfriend (and later, wife)’. In this game, he would berate employees for the slightest imperfections, and walk away from business deals, trying to leave the contestants as devastated as possible, and then when the contestant would reach out to Emilie, or if she just ‘happened’ to come across them, she would calm them down and offer to also sooth over her husband, but they would need to make an offering of some kind, otherwise he wouldn’t be appeased. Afterwards, they would meet up, and laugh with glee as they each recount their sides of events, and tally up the spoils against the other contestants, to rank them and track who was the biggest loser of them all.

* * *

  
That was how Nathalie came into their lives. While Emilie was previously aware of Nathalie, because they had a couple classes together in university, they never really talked before. Emilie started modelling as a freshman, but her and Gabriel didn’t fall in love until she was a Junior, and they got married a few months after graduation. It was after graduation, but before their marriage that Nathalie was hired. She was highly competent, but that didn’t stop her from getting berated by Gabriel. This was her first real job, and she didn’t want to get fired and become a failure, and every time she felt lost, Emilie was there to help fix her mistakes. The problem was that people could only push too far, and Emilie could tell that Nathalie was considering leaving, but Nathalie was far too valuable to lose, so Emilie had an idea. Later that day, Gabriel praised Nathalie for her work on some task, and just like that, Nathalie was practically begging for more praises, which were doled out over so slowly. She’d still get berated of course, but she’d put up with it to make Gabriel and Emilie happy. Emilie knew that the little puppy thought she was in love with Gabriel and maybe even Emilie too, but would Nathalie accept Emilie’s darkness the way that Gabriel did? Maybe, Nathalie clearly accepted Gabriel’s darkness, but people can be fickle and are often turned of by a trait in a woman, when the same trait in a man turns them on. Nathalie has been with them for so many years now, her whole adulthood devoted to them. On several occasions, Emilie had even considered suggesting to Gabriel that he give the pitiful woman a birthday screwing, because she did earn a good award. As long as she wasn’t publicly humiliated, and Gabriel came back to her at night, she didn’t care what he did in his free time. Emilie wasn’t the possessive sort, not with Gabriel at least, since she knew his heart belonged to her, even after all these years. That’s actually why she didn’t suggest it in the end, because Gabriel wouldn’t go through with it, and it would only cause trouble, either with Nathalie, or because Gabriel would be too confused about it and think Emilie was bored of him or something.

Now Nathalie is Emilie’s only ally in bringing back Gabriel. Most of the time, she is running the business side of the company, but she has also stepped up to become Mayura from time to time. Emilie can’t allow Nathalie to use the peacock too much, otherwise she would become too sick to run the business. After much discussion between the two, and time bouncing ideas off of each other, not only had they figured out how to make stronger akumas, they figured out how to make multiple akumas. The hard part, of course, was finding and being ready for an event to create multiple akumas. The narrowness of the timing for such an event practically requires it to be orchestrated, but to do so without exposing herself was tricky. But maybe she doesn’t have to be the one orchestrating the event, maybe she just needs someone like herself to do it instead.

* * *

  
A few months ago, it was like a prayer was answered, when Chloe had introduced Emilie to her classmate, Lila Rossi. Emilie could instantly tell that Lila was cut from the same cloth that she was. Unfortunately, Lila’s character was already exposed to her classmates, so it was going to be an uphill battle. Clearly, Lila didn’t have proper mother to teach her how every lie has a kernel of truth to it. If she wants to claim to be friends with famous people, then she should have pictures with herself and said famous people (at least a few of them). If she wants to tell people that she does charity work, then she should actually do charity work, and get pictures of it. Once she has proof, she can always embellish later. Of course, if she’s going to embellish something, then she should know enough about the topic, so if someone else is familiar, she can stand up to their questioning. The other problem with Lila was that her greed for fame was way too transparent. Of course, that wasn’t a problem for Emilie, since she could provide fame in exchange for information and protecting Emilie’s darling ‘niece’ Chloe.

Lila was certainly observant, and did indeed prove informative about the students in the akuma class. Everyone in that class had been akumatized at least once, but there were three akumas in that class that stood out above the rest. First, there was Princess Justice, who was the strongest akuma to date. Her creativity and adaptability were beyond compare. Unfortunately, she lost last time, and now there were more heroes, so she would need some extra help as well. Second, there was Dark Cupid, he was actually the crux of the plan. With his power to create hatred, it meant she could create an army of akumas with different powers. Zombizou, Darkblade, and Princess Fragrance were initially promising and could all create obedient hordes, but the minions were all the same and become too predictable to stand up to the heroes. Third, there was Chameleon, who could ruin lives without leaving proof that an akuma was involved.

As Emilie planned, she knew that Dark Cupid was the most important piece on the board, and she couldn’t risk losing him. If this plan failed, he’d still be vital for future plans. On the other hand, Princess Justice had fended off her second attempt at akumatization, so this time she’ll need to be completely broken. Even if she’s taken off the board, an arrow from Dark Cupid could bring her back. From that, the plan was formed; manipulate Lila into ruining Princess Justice’s life, and the life of Dark Cupid’s best friend, maybe in an act of betrayal against Dark Cupid himself. That should be enough to akumatize most if not all of the class, most importantly Dark Cupid himself, and Princess Justice could protect him while the army grows and then lead the final battle.

She didn’t even need to suggest that Lila become akumatized for this, because the girl was already stealing akumas, so she could transform and cause trouble for people that barely even slighted her. As a willing victim, and someone who was deakumatized without the object being broken, she was able to keep her memories, and she was using them to practice being other people. Lila was already planning on ruining the Ladyblogger girl, and wanted no one to be the wiser as to what happened, not even the heroes. The plan went perfectly, until it didn’t… the scarlet butterflies were sent out to a huge wave of negative emotions, but by the time they arrived, the students were filled with a righteous defiance against Lycaena (not useful) and a calming hope (also not useful). Apparently, after being expelled, Princess Justice gave a speech about how she’ll prove her innocence by proving Lila was akumatized (that was supposed to be a secret), and that she was going to take Lycaena down while she was at it, so they could enjoy school again without the fear of akumas (that last bit totally had Lycaena quaking in her boots *sarcastic eyeroll*).

Despite the failure, Lila did manage to pull off what Emilie had requested, which was the removal of Princess Justice and Dark Cupid’s best friend from Chloe’s life, so she was rewarded with modelling with Adrien. Lila clearly had designs on joining the family to boost herself. Emilie’s initial thought was that it could be fun. With Lila as a daughter-in-law, Emilie could teach the girl to hone her craft. Plant seeds of destruction in the lives of whoever stands in their way. They could even act in movies together. Of course, that fleeting dream didn’t last against the reality that Lila Rossi could never truly be trusted. She’s seen into the girl’s heart, and she has no doubt that she’ll be betrayed as soon as she lets her guard down. As soon as Lila is in line for the inheritance, a simple accident or two will place everything into Lila’s hands. So no, for now Adrien will do some photoshoots to keep Lila happy, until there’s a new plan that requires Chameleon. Once victory is secured, Lila can be disposed of, somebody will need to be sacrificed to bring back Gabriel after all, and Lila would make a dangerous loose thread to leave around. Maybe then it’ll be time for Gabriel and Emilie to look for a proper woman for Adrien to marry. The Tsurugi girl is good marriage material and could run the company, but Adrien can run the company himself, and neither of them can design. It’d be better to find a capable designer to marry, and keep the full leadership of the business in the family.

* * *

  
Speaking of Adrien, Emilie’s sweet little baby… ok, technically he’s her sister’s baby. When Emilie found out her sister was having twins, she was ecstatic. Emilie knew she and Gabriel needed a child to round off their perfect life, but as a model and actress, the idea of a stretch marks was a hard pass. Thankfully, it wasn’t hard to convince Amelie to let go of one of the twins, due to Gabriel’s ‘infertility’. Adrien was a sweet little perfect boy, always working to make his mother happy. If only Gabriel would get the memo. Gabriel kept treating Adrien like an employee, kept playing their game on Adrien to keep him in control. Adrien was family, he wasn’t going to steal Gabriel’s work, he wasn’t going to try and destroy the company, he wasn’t going to betray them. Adrien’s desire to go to school and make friends was clearly to fill the void that Gabriel refused to fill.

Maybe Gabriel secretly wished that they got Felix instead. Felix was someone that Gabriel could understand, but Emilie could understand Felix better, because after all, they were similar. They may not be made from the same bath of cloth that Emilie and Lila were made from, but they were at least produced in the same factory. Sure, Felix doted on his parents, especially Amelie, who doted on him in return, but that’s because Amelie didn’t see Felix for who he truly was. Sure, Amelie was a bit sneaky, she enjoyed her pranks, and she had some selfish tendencies, but overall Amelie was a good person, not like Emilie and Felix.

Just like Lila, Felix wasn’t someone that could truly be trusted. Felix would inevitably betray them, and he was much more cleaver than Lila. The fact that Adrien and Felix were identical, was a concern, so it was good that they lived in two different countries. It’s also a good thing that Felix and Lila should have no reason to ever meet. That would only cause problems that Emilie doesn’t need to deal with. So yes, despite whatever has been going through Gabriel’s head, she was glad to have Adrien as her son. While Felix might be capable of accepting Emilie for who she truly is, she would always be on edge with him around. While Adrien might not accept the real her, she could just continue playing her role around him as she does with everyone else, knowing that he is her perfect little obedient boy, who would never betray his loving mother.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If Emilie ever wakes up in the show, this is how I'm expecting her to be.  
> The difference I've made between Emilie and Lila, aside from Emilie being a more experienced liar, is that she's not as spiteful as Lila. Emilie will hurt people to get what she wants, to defend what she wants, or for fun, but she doesn't bother holding a grudge against people for slighting her. If there's a problem, she'll fix it, teach the person a lesson, and then let it go. Her life is too important to dwell on others that aren't worth it.


	10. Lazy Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now used to akuma attacks throwing everyone behind schedule, some people have become too productive and have run out of things to do.

Super Friends

Donkey Kong (Kim/King Monkey, full time Monkey hero): IM SOOOO BOOOOOOOORED

Donkey Kong: I don’t get it

Donkey Kong: Before akumas I was never bored

Donkey Kong: With akumas I was never bored

Donkey Kong: Now that akumas are taking a break

Donkey Kong: I

Donkey Kong: AM

Donkey Kong: SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Donkey Kong: BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORED

I’m not a Cow (Ivan/Big Blue, part time Ox hero): Don’t you do spots or something

I’m not a Cow: Go practice sport

Donkey Kong: I DID

Donkey Kong: Actually I did it too much and my body isn’t working

Stop calling me a Bronie (Max/Pegasus, full time Horse hero): Doing your homework would be a productive use of your time.

Donkey Kong: I DID

Donkey Kong: It’s all done

Donkey Kong: Even next weeks homework

TMNT (Nino/Carapace, full time Turtle hero): Dude!

TMNT: Don’t you have a girlfriend?

TMNT: Go hangout with her!

Neither seen nor heard (Juleka/Tigress, temporary Tiger hero): I’m on my way to meet up with my girlfriend right now

Not Kermit’s Wife (Rose/Princess Pig, part time Pig hero): ME TOO!

Not Kermit’s Wife: Meeting girlfriend not bored!

Donkey Kong: She’s out of Paris

Donkey Kong: Cousins birthday

Donkey Kong: Not allowed to call

Cock-a-doodle (Nathaniel/Hahn, part time Rooster hero): You should draw

Cock-a-doodle (Nathaniel/Hahn, part time Rooster hero): Drawing makes time fly by once you get into the groove

Donkey Kong: I cant draw

Nope Rope (Luka/Viperion, full time Snake hero): You can practice an instrument

I’m not a Cow: Yeah

I’m not a Cow: My band has been spending our extra time practicing

I’m not a Cow: It’s been great

Not Kermit’s Wife: Samesies

Neither seen nor heard: Samesies

Not Kermit’s Wife: Ha! First

Nope Rope: Samesies

The Dozen Mousketeers (Mylene/Souris, part time Mouse hero): I’ve been watching my boyfriend’s band practice

The Dozen Mousketeers: That and volunteer work at animal shelters

I’m not a Cow: Wow

I’m not a Cow: How many of us are in a band?

I’m not a Cow: Maybe we should start a superhero band

The Chat’s Meow (Adrien/Chat Noir): I call dibs on piano!!!

Judy Hops (Alix/Bunnix, future Bunny hero): I hate to be the realist here but when the akumas come back you guys wont have time to be in 2 bands

Not Kermit’s Wife: Boooooooo

Not Kermit’s Wife: Burn the naysayer

Buzz Buzz (Aurora/Honey Bee, part time Bee hero): Those without talent always try to stand in the way of those with talent

Neither seen nor heard: Ooooooo BURNED!

Judy Hops: Whatever

Judy Hops: Just don’t complain when theres no time to be in 2 bands

Judy Hops: And FYI people think my art is rather rad

Cock-a-doodle: Go team Art!

Belle (Mireille/Balta, part time Dog hero): Oooo Buzz and I are into performance arts

Belle: Can we be on team Art?

Cock-a-doodle: Approved!

Cock-a-doodle: So we have 4 Art vs 5 Music

Judy Hops: Anyone else on team Art?

Judy Hops: We can win

Judy Hops: I can feel it

Judy Hops: TMNT?

TMNT: Sorry

TMNT: I’m on team Music

Judy Hops: I should have known better than to trust a turtle

Garbage Disposal (Marc/Billy Gruff, part time Goat hero): I’m a writer

Garbage Disposal: Are there any other writers?

Lizard Queen (Kagami/Ryoko, full time Dragon hero): I perform Martial Arts, does that count?

Cock-a-doodle: Approved!

Cock-a-doodle: So we have 5 Art vs 6 Music

Donkey Kong: No!

Donkey Kong: Queen should be on team Sport with me

The Chat’s Meow: I also do sports, can I be on two teams?

Judy Hops: If Chat can be on 2 teams then I should also be on team Sport

Garbage Disposal: So is that a no on other writers?

Not Kermit’s Wife: I write song lyrics

Not Kermit’s Wife: I’ll join team Word

TMNT: Rena is also on team Word

Cock-a-doodle: Ok so the current tally is 3 Word, 4 Sport, 6 Art, and 6 Music

Stop calling me a Bronie: Unless Queen’s Martial Arts are done as a performance and not strictly used in combat and competitions; I would not quantify it as an art, so 5 Art.

Stop calling me a Bronie: Also, I’m a programmer, while technically, written words are involved to a large degree, it’s more of an engineering or science task.

Stop calling me a Bronie: I suppose that puts me on team Logic.

Stop calling me a Bronie: So, 1 Logic

Nope Rope: I think he just called the rest of us illogical

Stop calling me a Bronie: If the team fits

Neither seen nor heard: Ouch, Mega Burn, Scorched Earth Style

TMNT: Hm, half of Rena’s writing are of the investigative nature, so she belongs on team Logic as well.

Foxy (Alya/Rena Rouge, full time Fox hero): Damn Straight

Foxy: Btw Spots is on team Art

Cock-a-doodle: YES!

Foxy: And there must be logic behind the insanity of her Lucky Charms

Stop calling me a Bronie: Indeed, her Lucky Charms have a Rube Goldberg nature to them. I decree them to be logical, though convoluted.

Foxy: Also, more importantly, I found a major lead

TMNT: A lead on what?

Foxy: Lycaena!

The Chat’s Meow: What?

Cock-a-doodle: What!

Not Kermit’s Wife: What!!

Donkey Kong: Where?

Lizard Queen: I’ll get my sword

Foxy: The school board

TMNT: What do you mean

Foxy: I think she’s on the school board, or she bribed them

Master: Why don’t you explain from the beginning.

Judy Hops: Oooo, someone woke the dragon

Lizard Queen: I’ve been awake for hours

Master: Let’s give Rena a chance to explain

Master: And limit our questions until she’s done

Foxy: So, I was looking through the Mayor’s leaked money trails, and he used city money to bribe several people on the school board. I decided to look into them, and what proposals they passed. A few years ago, after a suicide due to bullying, France passed an anti-bullying law to improve things. It didn’t go far enough, but it did make some improvements, and all of the schools in France have been following the law, even the schools in Paris, more or less. I don’t think the teachers were following the rules when it came to Chloe. But, you know how Lycaena appeared on the first day of school last year? Well, earlier that summer, the school board in Paris changed the bullying regulations. Not only did they get rid of all of the improvements from that law, but they went even further and made it so that the teachers should go easier on the bullies, and take the victims aside and talk to them about being a bigger person.

Foxy: Which isn’t much better than victim blaming, and would make the victim feel even more hopeless.

Foxy: My first thought was that the school board wants there to be more suicides for some reason, because that’s totally what would have happened.

Foxy: But then I noticed the timing of the changes and realized that before a kid would get to the point of suicide, they’d probably get akumatized.

Foxy: From what I can tell, all of the teachers and staff at Dupont are following the new rules accept the science teacher

Foxy: Which is probably why that school has so many akumas.

Foxy: I think we need to investigate everyone that voted for this, at least one of them must have been bribed or blackmailed for this specifically.

Master: That is a very good theory, but Lycaena is cleaver and good at hiding her tracks.

Foxy: So, you don’t think it’s worth investigating?

Master: I didn’t say that, I’m saying don’t exclude someone too quickly.

Master: What if the person behind this actually voted against the new rules?

I’m not a Cow: Why would they do that if they wanted it to pass

Master: They could have convinced the others that this was a good choice, and then switched their own vote last minute, putting the blame on the rest.

Foxy: I see

Foxy: Well, there’s only a few of them, and at least one of them should have a connection to someone that’s connected Lycaena.

Master: Hopefully

Master: There’s some other things to consider

Master: Lycaena has a limited range, though we don’t know what the range is and it takes time for the akumas to reach their targets

Master: Dupont is a school for exceptional students, but that also means that many of them may have a lot more pressure on their shoulders than students at most other school, either pressure they put on themselves, or the expectations of their parents and teachers. That is probably why Dupont has more akumas than other nearby schools.

Master: Even if students are other schools are in a state of mind to be akumatized, if they’re far away from Lycaena they may calm down before the akuma reaches them.

Stop calling me a Bronie: So, Dupont is within the effective range of Lycaena’s lair. I can take a look at other high-pressure schools in Paris, to estimate the effective range. Then we can use that data to narrow down a list of suspects.

Master: Exactly

Master: Also, we must be careful, or Lycaena will be tipped off.

Foxy: Cool.

Foxy: I’ve been up all night digging into this, so I’ll leave the planning to Master and Spots while I go to bed.

Foxy: Spots… you there?

Lady in Spots (Marinette/Ladybug): Hi, this is Mullo. She’s still asleep.

Donkey Kong: What?

The Dozen Mousketeers: Hi Mullo

Lady in Spots: Hi Souris

Donkey Kong: I just had lunch

The Dozen Mousketeers: I miss you

Lady in Spots: I miss you too

The Dozen Mousketeers: Maybe we can have a visit once Tikki is better

Lady in Spots: I'd like that

Judy Hops: It’s time for someone to wake up

Lady in Spots: I’ve been trying.

Lady in Spots: I’ll tell her to read the chat when she wakes up

* * *

Lady in Spots: Guys

Lady in Spots: Seriously

Lady in Spots: Way too much personal information in the chat

Lady in Spots: Oh, good job Foxy

Lady in Spots: With Sass having been healed we can investigate without anyone knowing

Lady in Spots: Only 5 minutes at a time

Lady in Spots: And having to remember everything that was discovered

Lady in Spots: But I’ll figure something out


	11. Gorilla

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The life and times of a modern day gorilla.

He wasn’t always a bodyguard, but he was known as a Gorilla for most of his life. He wasn’t born with a desire to protect rich kids; the first real interest he had was poetry. The problem with poetry is that ‘men don’t read poetry’, ‘only girls and wusses like poetry’, and other teasings of the sort, not just by his classmates, but also by his father. He was a gentle giant by nature, and when he first started school he was already almost the size of the average adult. Initially, several of his classmates were afraid of his size, but looking at him sit in class was comical, because he kept getting stuck in the small desks. It didn’t take long for the seat to fall apart, and he landed on his butt. Everyone laughed, but it quickly died down when they saw his frustration on his face. He kept his cool, and the teacher was able to get a teenager sized desk the next day. The fear that he would turn out to be a bully like some of the older siblings had mentioned had died down. A little while later, someone realized that the books he read during lunch were poetry books for kids. After that, the kids started playing games with each other, to see what they could get away with, of course, the target of their games was the Gorilla. Sometimes they’d see how hard they could hit him while playing tag. Other times it would be to steal and hide his poetry book. A couple tried to read the book, but it was still a couple years too difficult for them. Eventually the games turned to throwing rocks. The rocks hurt, and they made him angry, he wanted to hurt the kids back, but he promised his mother he would control himself and be careful not to hurt others. As the kids watched him storm off without retaliating, it made them realize they could get away with more. That pattern of escalation abruptly stopped one day when one of the kids torn the poetry book in half, and that kid ended with a broken arm. Apparently, he’s been bullying the rest of the class since the start of school, and all of the other students have been afraid of him. In the end, the parents of the other children were too afraid to let their children be in the same class as him, so the school had him transfer to a different school that was a bit farther away. On top of that, the family of the child with the broken arm sued his family.

For his new school, he decided the leave his poetry books at home, it was concerning, because his father didn’t like him reading them, but he found a good hiding place. He decided to become someone new at this school, and he made the choice to play more sports during recess to try and fit in. At first, it was great, all of the kids wanted him on his team. Unfortunately, everyone wanted him on their teams. Arguments started to break out. Since he’s the size of three normal kids, he should count as three kids, right? Eventually it was decided that it’d be best if he wasn’t on any of the teams, and he was once again left to his own devices, but this time without poetry to keep him company. By the time he was old enough to join a school sports team, all of the other kids had a lot more experience, and he couldn’t just couldn’t keep up. Sure, he could have put the effort in to catch up, but that’s a lot of work for something he actually wasn’t that interested in. The real reason he wanted to join a team was to make friends, and having something in common was supposed to help. His years spent at school followed the same pattern; he’d join a new club or start a new hobby, use it to try to relate to others, and then end up dropping it due to either having a lack of interest or not really being compatible with it. He was on good friendly terms with most students, but none of them felt like the lifelong friendships that he was supposed to be making during these years.

* * *

Just like his school life, he often wished for a better home life. Don’t get him wrong, he loved his mother, she was the best mother he could have asked for… his father on the other hand... well Gorilla has long since forgotten what his father was like while sober, if that had ever happened. There was also the issue that money was tight after any major sporting event, and then eventually also after more and more minor sporting events, or any event really. Of course, everything that went wrong was the Gorilla’s fault, and because of that he was constantly berated and belittled. His father was a verbally and emotionally abusive man, but as far as Gorilla knew he was never physically abusive, until one day when that changed.

While at the age of ten, Gorilla’s father was drunk again (is it again if he’s never sober), yelling about something, berating his son about things he didn’t really understand what he did wrong. His mother was trying to calm his father down, and suddenly, his father hit his mother, knocking her to the ground. With his father standing over her, with a raised fist, going to strike again, Gorilla knew he needed to protect his mother, so he ran over and punched his father in the face. Even at the age of ten, Gorilla was already an inch taller than his father, so that punch had the full force of an adult body charging behind it, and it knocked his father down and dazed him. Gorilla then grabbed his father, and dragged him outside, left him in front of the door, and locked his father out. When he reached his mother, she was already getting up, but he reached out, and gave her support, which she turned into a hug that left them both crying. When Gorilla returned home after school the next day, the TV and a few other valuable things were missing, but he never saw his father again.

* * *

A few years later, he was trying to figure out which university he wanted to go to, but he had no idea what he wanted to do with his life. Over the years he had tried so many hobbies and whatnot, and nothing stuck. By this time, he had completely forgotten about his love for poetry, so he felt completely aimless. It was during this time that he remembered his proudest moment in his life, which was when he protected his mother from his father. The thought of protecting good people from bad people appealed to him. With the current global climate, and wars going on, it wasn’t a big jump for him to defend his country from its enemies. So, once he graduated school, he enlisted in the military.

The next few years in the military had its ups and downs. Eventually he found his way into a tightknit unit, they were almost like a family. His commanding officer was a good guy, and Gorilla looked up to him like an older brother. After a couple years, the commanding officer found out that his wife was pregnant. The officer decided that he wanted to be around for his child, and once the current tour was over, he left the military and had a friend hook him up with a job as a bodyguard. Without a CO, the Gorilla and the rest of the unit were broken up and sent to other units.

There was something weird with his new unit. The first thing was that they’d whisper to each other a lot, and clam up when he approached them. They ended up going to several locations that had little strategic importance. He kept getting sent to scout out the areas, separating him from the rest of the unit, and with his size, he wasn’t a great scout. Much more likely to alert the enemy to his presence than to find the enemy. One day he finished scouting faster than the rest of the expected, and he found them loading drugs into the truck. He was surrounded by his ‘allies’, all of whom were armed. His new CO came up to him and asked if he wanted a hit. He knew he had no choice, so he did the only thing he could to stay alive, and he took the drugs, hoping that he wouldn’t become addicted to them like his father was to alcohol. All he had to do was play along until he could get in contact with a superior officer, but finding out which one would be important. Not that it mattered, because the next day, as they were driving back to the base, the first truck hit a landmine killing everyone inside. The truck he was in swerved to avoid the totaled truck, causing it to roll over, tossing him out of the truck, and knocking him out.

* * *

When he awoke, he found himself in the bed in some house. He tried to sit up, but a man rushed over and pushed him down, saying that moving will pull out the stiches. Gorilla didn’t understand the man’s language very well, but he understood it enough. Gorilla tried to talk, but his throat hurt, and he could barely get a sound out. The man explained that Gorilla’s throat was cut by shrapnel, so he shouldn’t try to talk until it’s healed. The man continued to explain that most of the people in this village won’t be friendly, so he needs to stay hidden until he’s well enough to leave.

While he recovered, Gorilla got to know the man and woman that saved him, along with their two children. The kids had a couple western superhero comics and other books, so while everyone was out at working or at school, he ended up reading. One of the books turned out to be a poetry book, and after all these years, he finally remembered his lover for poetry. Though he couldn’t talk, and he didn’t know how to read and write their language, having only learned a some of it verbally, he was still enjoying his time with them and bonded with the family.

Once he was recovered, all he needed to do sneak out of the village and walk three or four days to his base. The family had a car, but it’d be noticed if it was turned on in the middle of the night. Of course, for whatever reason, someone was out and about in the village in the middle of the night, and spotted Gorilla as he was leaving the house. The guy ran off yelling, and all Gorilla could think was that he needed to protect the family. The family already knew they were in trouble, so the parents were already grabbing the children and what money they had, while Gorilla grabbed the car keys and got the car started. Once everyone was in, they drove towards the base, though they did need to serve a bit to avoid the gunfire from the man that spotted him. They were already out of sight by the time other villagers were able to make it out of their homes.

To say that the soldiers guarding the gate where surprised to see Gorilla, would be an understatement. They tried to ask him questions, but all he could do was grunt and motion that he wanted to write something. By the time he finished writing a brief explanation, more soldiers had arrived. They decided to have a doctor look at Gorilla and then question him, while they detained the family. The doctor confirmed what was expected, that Gorilla’s voice box was damaged in a way that he’d most likely never be able to properly talk again. Surgery to the voice box could improve things a bit, but there was also nerve damage, leaving it partially paralyzed. Next he was questions for a while. He wrote down everything that happened, including the discovery that his unit was transporting drugs, but he didn’t know until the night before they hit the landmine, so he hadn’t had a chance to inform anyone yet. In turn, Gorilla found out that after the explosion, soldiers found the site and investigated it, finding the drugs which were mostly destroyed. An investigation was preformed, and the rest of the unit was arrested, they had tried to blame everyone on Gorilla, but his name was cleared. As for the family, they were able to apply for refugee status. Gorilla was able to reach his old CO, and after explaining the situation, the paperwork was expedited, and the family was able to enter and stay in France with Gorilla.

* * *

During his call with his CO they discussed something else that was an urgent matter. When Gorilla went missing, and there were no leads, everyone feared that he was captured, probably being tortured for information before being killed. The former CO has been trying to keep an eye on and make sure Gorilla’s mother was ok, but in her grief, she has been growing frail. Thankfully Gorilla didn’t reappear too late, and by the time he returned home, she was already on the road to recovery. He introduced the family to her, and explained how they saved him, and because of that they were now refugees. In thanks, his mother offered her home to them until they could find their own. She also taught them French, while Gorilla talked to his old CO and got a job as a bodyguard. Of the family, the father would go out looking for work, often ended up with day jobs, while the mother stayed at home and would cook and help Gorilla’s mother regain her strength. Within a couple of months, the summer was over and the kids were enrolled in school, while their parents had found jobs, and they were able to rent a place down the block from Gorilla and his mother. Even today, a few years later, the six of them have remained close. Sometime Gorilla or his mother would watch the kids while their parents would have a date night, or if they had to stay late to take care of the small up and coming business that they started. It was during these nights that the kids would read their latest superhero comics to him, they’d play board games together, and eventually Gorilla started having them read poetry he had written to get their thoughts and opinions.

As a bodyguard, he had to watch over and protected various men, woman, and children over the years. Some of these wards he liked more than others, but in the end, it was always a job. One day he was suddenly reassigned to replace a different bodyguard. Apparently, the previous bodyguard was out drinking and revealed some family secret or something, so it was requested that the replacement didn’t drink and knew how to keep his mouth shut, and as Gorilla didn’t drink nor could speak anymore, he was the perfect replacement. That’s how he came to watch over Adrien Agreste.

Watching over Adrien, he came to notice similarities between their childhoods. Both of them had desperately wanted to make friends. The difference was that Gorilla just wasn’t good at it as a child, while Adrien wasn’t even allowed to have a chance to make friends. Another thing was how both their fathers would berate them. Like his mother, Emilie would enable Gabriel’s behavior by smoothing things over and apologizing on Gabriel’s behalf. But the difference between his mother and Emilie was that Emilie wasn’t also abused, in fact, it was a little known secret that Emilie was the one with the power in the relationship. If she truly wanted Gabriel to stop, she could have gotten him to stop. Another difference was that Gabriel would never apologize for his own behavior. Gorilla’s father would usually apologize after sobering up (oh, that’s right, he was actually sober sometimes) and make a nice breakfast or something (how was it so easy to forget the good times they had, was it because they only happened in connection to bad times?). Sure, that was actually part of the cycle of abuse, but it was nice to think his father at least cared enough to pretend to regret his actions, even if he didn’t stop doing them, but Gabriel clearly didn’t care about his son, and Emilie only seemed to care as far as Gorilla could tell.

It was clear that Adrien needed help, the help that Gorilla wish he received as child. There was problem though, not only did the parents employ him, and could easily fire him if he made one wrong step, but if he tried to push for any type of legal action, their money and power could wipe the whole thing under the rug. Gorilla needed advice, and there was immediately one person that stood out that he should talk to, though he didn’t want to, not about this. He had avoided the topic of his father for years, but he needed to talk to his mother about it. He started by explaining what he noticed with Adrien, the abusive behavior of the parents, and Adrien’s own low self-esteem. How Adrien was treated more as rare breed of pet meant to win awards instead of an actual child. They then went on to discuss the abuse dealt by Gorilla’s father, when it started, how it escalated, how it became physical against his mother long before Gorilla first saw it and protected her, why didn’t other people try to help, turns out a few tried but were pushed away, why she let it go on for so long, and even why did they get married in the first place, what did she see in his father. In the end his mother got a restraining order and divorce (Gorilla never knew), not to protect herself, but to protect Gorilla, to make sure that he was neither hurt, nor end up in jail for hurting his father. In the end, she made it clear, it’s hard to help someone that doesn’t want help or isn’t ready for help. For Adrien to turn away from all that he’s ever known, it would be very difficult to convince him to do that, and it might be even harder for Gorilla to take Adrien away from his parents without his consent. His mother introduced him to a lawyer friend, and as bad as it is to say, it’d almost be better if Adrien was physically abused, because at least Gorilla could take photographs, take Adrien to a doctor, and the police would get involved from there. Physical abuse is easy to understand, it’s easy to say that a bruise is a bruise and hard to argue against a consistent series of bruises, but emotional abuse has to depend on the judgement of others, and not just that, but for people like the Agrestes, it is easier to buy people off. In the end, Gorilla was left in a holding pattern, recording the Agrestes, documenting any abuses he notices, all while silently protecting Adrien and sneaking him little freedoms where he could without getting fired, because if he was fired, then there’d be no one on Adrien’s side.

* * *

Not everything in Gorilla’s life recently was so gloomy and frustrating. The two kids in his adoptive family enjoyed his poetry and had encouraged him to write more, and to meet other poets. So now, on his days off, he’d meet up with a writing club, where they would read each other’s poems and short stories, offer critiques and criticisms. While his old military unit had become like brothers to him, a few of them had since joined the same bodyguard company as him and his CO, the people in this club were the friends he had spent his whole life searching for.

As it so happens, today was one of those days off, and he was on his way to meet the club. He got a haircut that morning, was wearing his best casual outfit he owned (which Adrien helped him pick out), and was going to pick up snacks as he was on snack duty today. There was a nice lady, correction, a nice single lady in the club that has been encouraging him to join a few others in trying to get their poems added to one of those collection books, or maybe post them on some sort of website, so they could reach a larger audience.

Gorilla opened the door to the bakery Adrien had him stop at the other day, their pastries were divine.

“Ok, but how are we going to sneak Adrien away from his bodyguard so he can have his day of fun?”

“What if we found someone that looks like Adrien, and have them switch clothes?”

“I’d think Adrien’s bodyguard knows what Adrien looks like well enough to tell the difference.”

“Correct, there’s a 0.02425% chance of that working.”

Gorilla walks up to the counter and grunts.

“How may I heeeeelp you.” The three kids stare at Gorilla, wondering how long he’d been there.

Gorilla pulls out his pen and pad of paper, ‘How do you know Adrien?’

“Um, we’re all homeschooled, and we’ve been chatting with him, as he’s also homeschooled, but you know that. I know he’s not supposed to make friends without his parents’ approval, but please don’t get him into trouble. He’s really lonely, we just want him to have some fun.”

Gorilla hands the girl another piece of paper, and she stares at it, “What’s this?”

Gorilla pulls out his phone.

“Oh, this is your phone number? Oh, you’ll help us sneak Adrien out to have fun?”

Gorilla nods, and then points to his eyes.

“As long as you can keep an eye on him?”

Gorilla nods again. Scribbling on his pad, he writes out ‘Fun Plan?’

“Oh, um, we haven’t actually gotten that far, it seemed silly to think about until we figured out his escape.”

Gorilla hold up his cell again.

The girl smiles at him, “Right, once we figure things out, we’ll keep you in the loop. Do you know when would be a good time to break from his schedule?”

Gorilla taps his head a couple times.

“You’ll think about it?”

Gorilla nods.

“Great!”

Gorilla proceeds to point to several pastries and they get boxed up. Today is already turning out to be a pretty great day, and now it’s time to meet up with his nice single lady friend.


	12. 25,913

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Using second chance outside of fighting akumas didn't exactly go as Adrien expected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woot, two chapters released in one day, slowly catching up.

25,913, that’s how many times he’s used second chance during this mission. Why did he count all of them? Was it to torture himself? Or keep himself grounded? He wasn’t sure. His team knew he’d use second chance a lot, but they all severally underestimated how many times he’d have to use second chance.

5 minutes, that’s how long he had before his time ran out and he couldn’t go back in time. 5 minutes times 25913 second chances, is 129565 minutes, or 2159.42 hours, or 89.98 days, or basically 3 months.

Now, why did Adrien become Aspik and need to use second chance so many times? Well, to answer that, let’s step back. Four weeks ago, all of the kwami were suddenly sick for an unknown reason, and had to be returned to Master Fu to be healed. Since then there have been no akuma attacks, so the same sickness has probably affected Nooroo and Duusu as well. About a week ago, Sass and Mullo had been healed enough to transform again, so they were handed to Adrien and Ladybug. Part of that was because Viperion would be out of town on a class trip in a couple weeks, so someone else should get practice using second chance, and it was given to Adrien because Master Fu knew how lonely the boy way. Having a companion, and a way to meet Ladybug wouldn’t fix the loneliness, but it would help. Last week, Rena Rouge discovered that the Paris school board had changed their bullying policy in a way that basically encouraged bullying, which would lead to more akumas. The reason this went unnoticed was because it happened during the summer before Lycaena had first appeared. From that, the heroes came up with a plan to identify everyone on the Paris school board and investigate them. They figured they’d need to break into their houses, go through all of their documents, hack their computers and probably hack their cellphones as well. As soon as Kaalki was healed, they could teleport into the homes and start the plan. With the use of second chance and teleporting, they should be able to gather all of the information that they needed.

The plan sounded simple, but another complication was occurring. Master Fu realized that as he healed the twelve zodiac Kwami, Trixx, Pollen, and Wayzz were healing as well, which meant that he was inadvertently healing Nooroo and Duusu as well. As the five elemental kwami were healed, it was also healing Tikki and Plagg. Master Fu wanted Tikki and Plagg to be the first ones healed, but it was looking more and more like they’d be the last ones healed. Each of the twelve zodiacs had different connections to the five elementals, so Master Fu has decided that after Kaalki was healed, he’s switch to concentrating on healing the zodiacs that were the most connected to Trixx, Pollen, and Wayzz first, and hopefully Tikki and Plagg would be ready to fight before Nooroo and Duusu. It was a bit of a gamble, and healing any kwami would mean the quicker return of akumas. That’s why they decided to investigate the school board as quickly as possible.

Ideally, they would sneak into the houses, take photos of all papers, leave behind a camera pointing to the computer monitor, and plug in a keyboard reader so they could learn any necessary passwords. That of course, would take several days or longer in hope that they’d log into their bank accounts and any other useful sites. Apparently, Pegasus had decent hacking tools, but to brute force as hack into the computer or any site would take longer than five minutes, and therefor would be noticed by the websites and get reported. After talking about it a bit, Pegasus realized he could try probably passwords for hacking into the computers, names of family members, important dates, ect. If that didn’t work, they could brute force logging into the PC, and have the hacking program split its list of passwords into 4 and a half minute groups. As long as Pegasus was told which attempt they were on, they would be able to hack into the computers within the 5 minute limit. Once hacked into the computer, they could install a program to use the computer remotely. Hacking into their email would tell them which banks they used, and then using social hacking, they could convince them to log into their banks, letting giving away those passwords.

All of this was highly illegal, so in the end, the only evidence that they were willing to leave behind was a hacking program that was installed on site. They didn’t want any computer to connect to it outside of the use of a second chance. Luckily, any data stored in Aspik’s lyre would remain after a second chance, meaning that Multimouse could photograph all of the papers quickly, and send them over, while Pegasus sent over hacked data from the computer. All of that data would later be sent to Pegasus and Rena Rouge to sort through.

It took a couple days Pegasus to write/modify programs to split up all of the hacking / downloading into 4 and a half minute intervals. There were only five members of the school board that had voting powers, so it wasn’t a lot of people to go through, though they all had work and home computers, so that was ten computers/offices to search, but then they decided to go through the spouse’s data as well, bringing the number up to eighteen, and hack into Mr. Damocles to see how he was told about the policy change, so twenty, but actually the spouses live together so they didn’t need to make separate trip to hack into those home computers, so it was actually sixteen different locations they needed to explore. There was also staff working for the board. Being that they could only hack into one computer per five minutes, and then they’d need to recharge. Kaalki actually would have to recharge after they arrived at each location, so they could also make an escape.

So, they had a plan. Hack into all of the computers on the first night, and install the remote hacking program without being noticed. The next night, they would use social hacking to get more data while also copying the data from the computers. Hopefully the data would be sorted through they would have more suspects to repeat the process on the next day.

Over the course of a week, they repeated that process three times, that was how Aspik used his second chance 25,913 times. Thankfully, Pegasus wrote Aspik something so he could binge watch Netflix in the 4 and a half intervals. It was about as annoying as constant commercials, but it did help. At first, he started with watching a few heist movies, he realized that was a mistake, but what he was doing was so incredibly boring compared to the movies. Aspik also took the time during the remote hacking nights to practice piano and learn study Chinese, get ahead of these so he could slack off later. He wanted to fence with Kagami a bit, but she couldn’t transform yet to hold up against him.

In the end, they discovered that two of the board members, and one board member’s wife were in fact bribed to make the vote, though tracing who made the bribe had run into a dead end for now. Was it worth it? Adrien wasn’t sure. They also found out that the mayor was abusing power to threaten Damocles into kowtowing to Chloe and her friends. That was useful, but how could he get that info to Marinette and her friends?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It wasn't until everything was already done, did Adrien realize it would have made more sense for him to use Kaalki and Pegasus use Sass for the operation.


	13. Found Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bunnix had a not so good, timey wimey adventure, all without leaving her Burrow.

Judy Hops (Alix/Bunnix, future Bunny hero): What up suckas

Judy Hops: Guess who’s finally getting their miraculous and will be jumping straight to a full-time hero?

Judy Hops: If you guessed me you’d be correct

(Rose/Princess Pig, part time Pig hero): Congrats! But why are you jumping straight to full time?

Judy Hops (Alix/Bunnix, full-time Bunny hero): Master thinks that since the kwami got sick, we should be prepared for the worst

Judy Hops: Master is going to start training me in time travel right now and training should last only a few seconds in normal time

Neither seen nor heard (Juleka/Tigress, temporary Tiger hero): Cool

Not Kermit’s Wife: How did the training go?

Not Kermit’s Wife: Hey Hops, are you back yet?

Not Kermit’s Wife: Judy?

Foxy (Alya/Rena Rouge, full time Fox hero): Yeah, how was it? Inquiring minds want to know

Judy Hops: So, the good news is that the moon won’t be broken in half, nor will the world be destroyed

Cock-a-doodle (Nathaniel/Hahn, part time Rooster hero): What?

Foxy: Was that even an option?

Judy Hops: I suppose that depends on your definition of ‘option’

Judy Hops: Future me stopped me from breaking time

Not Kermit’s Wife: Are you ok?

Stop calling me a Bronie (Max/Pegasus, full time Horse hero): Technically, everything is an option, no matter how improbable.

TMNT (Nino/Carapace, full time Turtle hero): Dude

TMNT: That’s not helping right now

Judy Hops: After future me stopped me, she faded out of existence

Judy Hops: And then I watched another future me also fade out of existence

Judy Hops: Seriously messed up

Foxy: I’m confused

Foxy: What happened?

TMNT: If you’re alright talking about it, could you start from the beginning?

Judy Hops: sure

Judy Hops: So the whole reason we knew I was going to be Bunnix was because when Time Tagger arrived, an adult me from the future showed up

Judy Hops: We actually was sent by Time Tagger to thousands of years in the past, and her Miraculous was damaged, so she couldn’t time travel

Judy Hops: So she went to sleep and waited for Time Tagger to show up, so she could stop him and get her Miraculous fixed

Judy Hops: With the battle finished, she went back to the future where she belonged

Judy Hops: Today, Master took me into the Time Burrow, which is like being inside of a time shell, and there’s all of these windows to different times

Judy Hops: Adult me was there running around, yelling “Who is Lycaena?” “What happened to Hawkmoth?”

Foxy: Who’s Hawkmoth?

Judy Hops: Getting to that

Judy Hops: So I was all like, “Hey what’s going on?”

Judy Hops: and Adult me froze and looked at us

Judy Hops: Then she looked at Master and was all like, “What are you doing here? You’re not who’s supposed to train me. Don’t touch anything!”

Judy Hops: Then she continued running around liking at different times

Judy Hops: I followed her and watched what she was doing

Judy Hops: At one point she was watching Lycaena in her lair, and Lycaena began to de-transform

Judy Hops: Suddenly a 3rd me from like a few days in the future pulled me away and said I shouldn’t see that

Judy Hops: She said that I, er, she failed to keep Lycaena’s identity a secret

Judy Hops: That somehow led to the final battle happening when we weren’t ready, and it led to earth ending consequences

Judy Hops: All of the heroes and villains, and a whole bunch of people were killed

Judy Hops: Even the moon was broken in half

Judy Hops: She said that there’s a time and place for everything, and that time was a very delicate thing

Judy Hops: using knowledge gained from time travel apparently tends to have consequences

Judy Hops: After she said that, she smiled at me

Judy Hops: It was a really sad smile

Judy Hops: And then she just faded away

TMNT: Shit

Judy Hops: Yeah, shit

Foxy: What about adult you

Judy Hops: after other me disappeared, adult me came over saying she didn’t have much time left, but basically, she’s adult me from a future of an alternate reality

The Chat’s Meow (Adrien/Chat Noir): What?

The Chat’s Meow (Adrien/Chat Noir): Is that a thing we need to worry about now?

TMNT: No interrupting!

Judy Hops: She said that the villains Hawkmoth and Mayura were supposed to be replaced by Farfalla and Pavone, but someone must have messed with time and Hawkmoth must have gotten the Ladybug and Black Cat Miraculous, and used them to make a wish, a wish that remade reality

Nope Rope (Luka/Viperion, full time Snake hero): Is that why Lycaena wants the Miraculous?

Nope Rope: To remake reality?

Judy Hops: Master said that for as long as he’s had the Miraculous, no one has used them to make a wish

Judy Hops: But that might explain why all of the kwami got sick

Judy Hops: Must have used up all of their energy or something

Cock-a-doodle: Can they really grant a wish?

Cock-a-doodle: Any wish?

Lady in Spots (Marinette/Ladybug): Yes, any wish, but…

Lady in Spots: There’s a reason why you need both Creation and Destruction to make the wish

Lady in Spots: It’s like Full Metal Alchemist

Lady in Spots: Equivalent Exchange

Lady in Spots: If you want to bring a love one back from the dead, a loved one will take their place

Lady in Spots: If you wish for there to be plenty of food for a village to survive a famine, the villager will die from disease instead

Lady in Spots: That’s how the black plague started, from a poorly worded wish

Lady in Spots: So even if you try to do something good with it, you’ll still do a lot of damage

Stop calling me a Bronie (Max/Pegasus, full time Horse hero): But that doesn’t explain how adult Judy Hops was still around?

Stop calling me a Bronie: Was she the same Judy Hops from Time Tagger?

Judy Hops: Yeah, she was

Judy Hops: She said that by the time I get to be her age, Time Tagger won’t happen

Judy Hops: It was all a glitch in time and reality

Judy Hops: Time Tagger caused her to be trapped for thousands of years, and she was from the future

Judy Hops: Since she has her own timeline from the rest of you, and so much of it, the wish is still catching up

Judy Hops: She said she figured out what the wish was, it was to change an event that happened about two years ago, and it probably also changed some events leading to it

Judy Hops: We talked for a few more minutes, she was telling me all of the awesome things her team did and how to be an awesome protector of time, before she just faded away

TMNT: Shit

The Chat’s Meow: Shit

Judy Hops: I went to get a drink of water after I got back and my dad asked me what was wrong

Judy Hops: I made up some lame excuse because I can’t tell my family that I almost destroyed the world

Judy Hops: I’ll probably wake up screaming tonight and there’s no akuma to blame it on

Lady in Spots: I understand the feeling and I’m sorry you’re going through this

The Chat’s Meow: Is there anything we can do to help?

The Chat’s Meow: You can lean on us

The Chat’s Meow: We’re your superhero family

Lady in Spots: Those of us with a Miraculous currently could find a rooftop somewhere and watch movies

Lady in Spots: I can bring snacks

Stop calling me a Bronie: We could even find a rooftop outside of Paris

Stop calling me a Bronie: I can take us to any rooftop in the world

The Chat’s Meow: No one will notice I’m gone after dinner

Judy Hops: Yeah

Judy Hops: That’d be great guys

Judy Hops: I’m going to do some art until then


	14. Senti-monster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a new unveiling at the Louvre.

Marinette, Alya, and Alix were at the Louvre waiting for the for the unveiling of the latest discovery. Alya was showing Marinette and Alix all of the hidden Guardian symbols in various artworks through history and the Ladybug spots that had faded from statues.

“Alya, you’re not to put this on your blog, right?”

“Relax girl, I know how secretive Master is, and I don’t want to get on his bad side.”

Marinette glances at Alix nervously, “Um, what?”

Alya rolls her eyes, “Geez, I already figured out that Alix is Bunnix.”

Marinette whines, “Alya!”

Alix’s mouth drops open, “What? Who?”

Alya huffs, “What? We’re all in the same chat together. After learning your identity, it was easy to figure out everyone else’s.”

Marinette hisses, “Alya!”

Alix looks at Marinette, “You figured everyone out because of Marinette?” Her eyes bug out and she whispers, “Ladybug?”

Marinette facepalms, “It’s supposed to be a secret.”

Alya crosses her arms in defiance, “Yeah, and she’s the hero of last resort. How will she know how bad things are if she doesn’t know who you are? What if an akuma gets you before you transform? Or if you get akumatized again.”

Alix looks between the two of them again, “Oh shit, Princess Justice, oh, you must have been Coccinelle. And Rena?”

“Yup!”

“So… you know who everyone else is?”

“Basically.”

“Even Chat?”

“No, not Chat nor Ryoko, as Chat picked her.”

Marinette takes her hand off her face, “I didn’t pick King Monkey.”

“Yeah, but he’s obviously Kim.”

This time Alix face palms, “Of course he’s Kim… oooooo, Pegasus, he’s Max, isn’t he? Does he know about you two, since you’re homeschooling together?”

“Yup, it took a bit to convince Marinette to let him know.”

Alix’s phone alarm goes off, “It’s time for the unveiling.”

* * *

The three of them head over to the unveiling which has a small crowd of people standing in front of something that has a sheet draped over it. Among the crowd, Marinette notices Jagged Stone, Adrien, Emelie, Nathalie, Gorilla, and, Nadia who was filming, or about to film.

Marinette grabs Alya’s and Alix’s arm and pulls them back, “I don’t want to get seen by Emelie or Nathalie. They shouldn’t recognize me, but I don’t want to risk it.”

Alix gives Marinette a confused look, to which Marinette responds, “I’ll explain later.”

So, the three of them stay in the back of the crowd, and watch the unveiling. Alix’s father gives a little speech, explaining where this statue was discovered, and then pulls off the sheet covering the statue, unveiling a statue of some kind of frog monster, and it had a Guardian symbol on its forehead.

Nathalie gasps, dropping her ever present tablet, and grabbing her head. Adrien and Gorilla help her leave, while Emilie takes a long look at the statue before following them.

Marinette takes a picture of the statue, and whispers to the other girls, “I’m going to ask Master about this. Since it was on TV, Lycaena might see it.”

Alya whispers back, “Go ahead, I’ll talk to Alix’s dad to learn more about it.”

* * *

Marinette was showing Master Fu all of the Guardian connections that Alya discovered.

When she scrolls over to the weird frog monster statue, Master Fu gets up and backs away, “Impossible! We’re Doomed!”

“Because of a statue?”

“That’s no statue, it’s a Sentimonster.”

“But Master, we’ve already defeated Sentimonsters created by Mayura.”

“Yes, but… none of them came close to the power of this one.” Master Fu then proceeds to tell his story of how during training he created the Sentimonster to find him food, but it ended up eating all of the Guardians and Miraculous. How it chased him until it fell into a chasm, and he lost the Peacock and Butterfly Miraculous.

“I thought the Sentimonster had disappeared forever. As soon as Lycaena finds out about it, she’ll be able to use the power of the Peacock to bring it back to life.”

“Master, if that happens, Chat Noir and I will be there.”

“But you won’t stand a chance! He’s totally immune to the powers of the Miraculous. Even worse, the Duusu might recover before Tikki and Plagg.”

“Maybe so, but a few of our Kwami have already been fixed… maybe we can fix things today, temporarily.”

“What do you mean?”

“We currently have Mullo, Sass, Kaalki, Fluff, Xuppu, and Roaar already healed. We could… oh! We could have Pegasus teleport the Sentimonster to some deserted island or cave or something. Then once we get Duusu back, she can undo the Sentimonster.”

Master Fu stares at Marinette for a moment, before sighing in relief, “Thank you Marinette, that’s a great idea. My mistake has been haunting me my whole life, it seems I was thinking out of fear instead of rationally.”

“It’s alright Master, from being Ladybug, I’ve learned that we all have regrets and make mistakes, what matters most is that we learn from them and do our best to fix them.”

Fu smiles at Marinette, “You’re very wise Marinette. Choosing you to be Ladybug was the best decision of my life, you will make a much better Guardian than I ever was.”

* * *

It was later that night, 2100 hours, Multimouse, Aspik, Pegasus, Bunnix, Chaos Chimp (Master Fu using Monkey Miraculous), and Tigress (Juleka) were on the roof of the Louvre, ready to pull of their heist.

Multimouse was holding a small bucket filled with mud, and a paintbrush. “Ok team, here’s the plan.

Step 1: Aspik will start his second chance while I divide.

Step 2: I’ll sneak in, and use this mud to cover up the cameras so no one will see what happens.”

Step 3: Pegasus sneaks in and uses Voyage to send the Sentimonster to the abandoned and collapsed mine. Pegasus, do you have the coordinates?”

“I do!”

“Great!

Step 4: Pegasus gets out, while I clean the cameras behind him and escape too.

If at any point something goes wrong, Aspik will reset and we’ll adjust the plan.

Everyone ready?”

Everyone nods.

“Multitude!”

“Second Chance! Wait!”

Everyone looks at Aspik, Master Fu asks, “What happened.”

“The statue, it’s not there.”

Master Fu gasps, “What?”

“We found a couple guards that were knocked out, it looked like it was grenades filled with knockout gas. We searched the whole Louvre, and even a few blocks outside the Louvre. Whoever stole it, is long gone.”

Master Fu sighs in defeat, “It must have been Lycaena, as soon as Duusu has recovered, they’ll attack. We’ve already lost, it’s just a matter of time.”

A fully reformed Multimouse speaks up, “Master, when they attack, we’ll win like we always do.”

“Feast can smell our Miraculous, it can target us in our sleep, even if we get away, Lycaena know where we live, probably your identities.”

Bunnix speaks up, “Isn’t this why I’m here? I’m the hero of last resort after all.”

“And if Feast attacks you first?”

“Well, then, he won’t, because I won’t be in Paris.”

“What do you mean?”

“In two days, my bother is going to Tibet to look for other artifacts around where the Sentimonster was found, probably explore the nearby temple too.”

“The Guardian temple.”

Bunnix’s eyes widen at that, “Really?”

Master Fu nods.

“Well, I can join my brother for a couple weeks. I’ll wait for a text about Feast from the chat, once I get it, I’ll go back in time an hour, and warn you guys.”

Master Fu’s shoulder relax with relief, “That’s a good plan. Thank you Bunnix.”

“Don’t mention it, it’s a small sacrifice for being a hero.”

“Sacrifice? I’d think traveling the world would be an adventure.”

“It would be, but I’ll be doing it with my brother… and heee gets some crazy ideas about the past.”

“Crazier than Magic Jewelry that gives you the power of the gods?”

“Uh, yeah!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chronologically, Gabriel made his wish some time after the end of season 3, and chapter 1 starts on the same calendar date, and in this AU Lycaena started her attacks at the same time as Hawkmoth, but due to the butterfly effect, the timing of other things have been affected. Due to one akuma or another, it's made some people change the priority of their projects, which changed the schedule of some events. Which is why this chapter happens now.
> 
> TLRD, for reasons, I wanted this episode to happen in this story, where it should have happened a couple months earlier.


	15. Homeless

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Adrien has more video calls with the home-school club, though these are more depressing conversations than he was hoping for when he became friends with them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning: mentions of suicide

**A few days ago during a video chat with the home-school club** :

Marinette frowns into the camera, “I thought learning about people and getting experience working together on projects was a good reason to go to school. Did she say why it’s not enough?”

Adrien sighs, “No, she said that if I want to read people better, then I can get a body language tutor after I finish learning Mandarin.”

Alya facepalms, “That’s really not the same thing.”

Marinette shakes her head, “I think she’s being overly obtuse on purpose.”

“Mother is only doing what she thinks is best for me.”

“Adrien, it’s the law that every child can go to school. She doesn’t have the right to keep you out of school.”

“Maybe, but what can I do about it?”

“Have you thought about hiring a lawyer?”

“Isn’t that a bit extreme?”

“Yeah, but not letting you go to school, or have friends is extreme.”

“Maybe it is, I guess I don’t really know what’s normal or not.”

“That’s fine. I don’t expect you to be ready to do it yet, but you should think about it. If you do get a lawyer involved, you’ll need to be ready to try and get emancipated.”

“What’s that?”

“Basically, it’s when you get a judge to say your parents aren’t treating you right, and the judge declares you to be an adult.”

“Um, that’s even more extreme.”

“Yeah, but child celebrities have a tendency to do it when their parents steal their money. It’s usually done because the parents are abusive or neglectful, well, I guess stealing your kid’s money would be a form of abuse.”

Adrien shakes his head, “Mother isn’t abusive, she’s just overly protective.”

“Isolating you from people is a form of abuse. I’ve been reading a psychology book, and it specifically mentions that.” ‘ _A book that Mr. Gorilla handed to me a few days ago, with several sections highlighted, clearly all things he’s noticed as being done to Adrien._ ’

“I wouldn’t expect you to just go out and do this today, but these are things you should consider and research. You have options, maybe when looking into this, you’ll find a better option.”

“How do I do it, get a lawyer? I’m not even allowed to leave the house when I want to.”

“Do you have access to your own money? Your modelling should have payed you more than enough you hire a lawyer.”

“Um, I get an allowance added to my card every month that I can use to buy stuff, or I can take out a hundred euros.”

“What about your modeling money?”

Adrien sheepishly rubs the back of his neck, “Um, I never asked. I kinda assumed that it’s being put into a bank account until I’ll older, or something. What would happen to Mother if I did this?”

“Assuming that she’s made a bank account just for you, where she puts all of the modeling money, then not much legally. Realistically, she’ll probably feel humiliated and angry at you.”

Adrien frowns “I love her, and I want her to be happy.”

“But, does she want you to be happy?”

“Of course!”

“Then why is it, I’ve only ever seen you pretend to smile instead of really smile?”

Adrien huffs in annoyance, “I have to go, my next tutor will be here in a minute.”

“Ok, but even if you don’t want to do it, just consider it. Maybe look up why other people have done it.”

* * *

**Today** :

Adrien hesitantly opens the email and clicks on the first link. It brings up Mayor Bourgeois hacked documents that were released.

Max and the rest of the home-school club are visible on his monitor. “Now, if you search for 20030804, that is the date of August 4th 2003, the number next to that we believe is a money amount, and then it has you’re mother’s initials of her maiden name, EGV, then three street names, the street you live on, and the two streets on either side of your house, and then there’s another set of initials, FBB.”

“Yes, I see all of that, what does it mean?”

“Well, do you know when your parents bought this property, or when the house was built?”

“No, I just know that we’ve lived here my whole life.”

“Ok, so, on the date of August 4th, 2003, there were several homes where your house is now, and over the course of several months, your parents bought those houses, and once they had them all, they knocked them down and built your house.”

“Ok? Don’t people buy houses all of the time, and for someone of my parent’s wealth, don’t they tend to knock things down and build new ones? I don’t see the issue here.”

“It wouldn’t be an issue, if they paid for what the houses were worth. Those last initials, FBB, are for a man named Frédérique Brisbois; he’s a safety inspector for the city. When someone complains to the city, saying that they think something is a hazard, Brisbois is one of the inspectors that will be sent out. He has the ability to fine owners if they don’t fix dangerous situations, or even condemn a building. Over the course of a few months, he condemned all of the houses that used to be where your house is.”

“Sooo, they were crummy houses?”

“While that is possible, it’s highly improbable that all of these houses would fall into such a bad shape at the same time without a major event like a fire. Additionally, there is the fact that Brisbois was the one to inspect all of these houses. Normally it’s randomly assigned. Attached to the email are three maps, the first map is a list of all of the inspections in 2003 and 2004, color coded by inspector, and the second map is all of the condemnations in 2003 and 2004. If you look, you’ll notice that there are a couple inspections at builds near to each other, but they were inspected by different people. The third map shows fines placed against the building owners. As you can see, Brisbois has both levied more fines and condemned more buildings that any of inspector. All of this data is in public record, and you can confirm the data in the second link. His initials appear many times in the mayor’s documents, many of those are accompanied with the addresses he has placed a fine or condemned the building.”

“So, my parents bribed the mayor to have his guy condemn the buildings they wanted to buy, so they could get it cheap?”

“That is what the data is pointing to.”

Marinette leans into a camera, “We’re sorry Adrien. The police have already confiscated Brisbois’ passport, and reporters have been discovering and reporting scandals for these documents every day. It seems that they’re reporting the newest scandals first, and working their way to older scandals, but it’s only time before they discover this. We’re only ahead of them because we’ve been looking up all of our friend’s families.”

Alya adds, “The only reason I haven’t reported this is because you’re my friend, but it’s only a matter of time. I’ve started articles about some of Brisbois’ other fines and condemnations. It seems that business have been using him to attack their competitors. I’m going to release that article later today.”

“So, what does this mean? What will happen to my mom?”

Marinette frowns, “It’s hard to tell exactly. It looks like the Mayor will lose the recall election, and we’ll have a new election in a few weeks, we have no idea who’ll take his place. The new Mayor might make an example out of a few people to appease Parisians, or they might push to get everyone involved arrested. There’s probably police, prosecutors, and judges involved, so who knows how much a new mayor can really do without things exploding more. Besides that, Mayor Bourgeois’ trial is coming up, and knowing him, he’ll probably start throwing people under the bus. Assuming they don’t try and arrest your mother, rich people usually get away without going to prison, then all of the families that were hurt by this will sue your mother.”

“Soo? They’ll want to get what their houses were worth? We should be able to afford that. It’d probably cost us less to make it go away than extended negative media exposure.”

“No, their lives were ruined, someone even died, so they’ll also sue for damages, to try and get every Euro they can get.”

“Someone died?”

“Yeah, the rest of the links are other documents and articles about what happened to the families we looked into. It’s complicated, but it’s not like they just lost money out of the deal and they could still buy a new house. Most of them had mortgages, and they owned more money to the banks than they. The banks wanted the remaining money, but they didn’t have it, so they had to declare bankruptcy. After that, it’s hard to find someone here to rent, let alone buy a new place. One family we looked into, it was a single father with three and five-year-old children, they had to live at a homeless shelter. A couple months later, the father lost his job, he was suddenly falling behind in his work and making a lot of mistakes, his boss said that before he lost his house, he was one of the best employees, but they were losing business because of him. A little while later, the government declared him an unfit parent, and took custody of his children, putting them into foster homes. Shortly after that, he committed suicide. It was an article written at the time about his suicide that figured this out. And the only reason there was an article was because the suicide was rather public. We stopped investigating there.”

Adrien was clearly distraught at the news, looked like he was on the verge of crying.

“Adrien, I’m sorry about all of this, you deserve better.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“No, and I don’t want to pressure you to do something you don’t want to do, or aren’t ready to do, but what we talked about the other day, about potentially getting emancipated. Well, it usually helps a lot if you have a job already, or have one lined up. If you went through with it, it’d mean you’d have to model for a different company. Right now, people will jump at that to get you, not only are they popular, but a lot of the competition doesn’t like Gabriel. But once this news comes out, you’ll suddenly lose your popularity along with your parents. Your parents haven’t let you do anything else in life, so it’ll be hard to find a normal job at our age that can pay for an apartment and food. That’s basically the minimum amount of money you’ll need to prove you’re an adult.”

“So, I can leave my parents now and be my own person, or it’ll be harder later leaving me stuck with them when they’re at their lowest? But if I leave, I can’t help them through this.”

“That’s not your job, they’re supposed to take care of you, make sure you’re happy, not the other way around.”

“I don’t know, how long do I have to think about it?”

“It’s hard to say. If the mayor throws your mom under the bus, not long, if not, you’ll have a couple of months maybe longer.”

Adrien sighs, “Thanks for looking out for me guys. I’ll let you know when I decide.”


	16. Tell a joke

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien needs some cheering up, so the home-school club presents some good news...

Adrien sighs as he looks into the monitor, “Hey Guys.”

Marinette frowns, “What’s wrong?”

“I spent the morning at the office again. I wanted to find out how things worked, so I tried asking around.”

“What happened?”

“When I talked to any of the higher ups, they just told me that it was too complicated to explain, and that they were busy. When I talked to someone else, she seemed really scared of me, and as she explained things, she kept asking if it was correct, like I was testing her. Why is it so hard to just get an answer? I didn’t need it to be an essay. Are the children of bosses really so scary?”

“Well, Chloe has been known to fire people, so maybe?”

Adrien rolls his eyes, “Sorry for being such a downer. Can one of you lighten the mood? Maybe tell a joke?”

Marinette smiles, “It’s not a joke exactly, but it might make you laugh. It’s some good news that we received just before you called.”

“Oh, good news? I’m intrigued.”

Marinette shares the screen with Adrien and plays a video.

* * *

The camera shows a locker room, from the angle, it’s maybe the height of the average student, maybe a bit higher. There’s some metal grating showing at the top and bottom of the camera.

Inside the room are two students, one is a tall athletic Asian teenager, and the other is Lila Rossi.

Lila, in her sickly-sweet voice, “Kim, it seems I forgot my lunch money today, would you be a dear and buy me some lunch, and carry my bag while you’re at it?”

Kim scoffs, “Oh, why don’t you have Chloe buy you lunch, or right, her daddy’s in trouble.”

Lila glares at Kim, “Just because she lost her power, it doesn’t mean I don’t have any.”

“Oh yeah? What are you going to do?”

“I’ll ruin your life, just like I did with your best friend Max.”

“Didn’t you also frame Alya and Marinette?”

“Yes, I framed all three, it was so easy, and I’ll frame you too. All I need to do is place an anonymous call, and you’ll be searched and tested for steroids. I hear that a lot of people expect you to participate in the Olympics in a few years, well, even suspicion can ruin your chances at the Olympics, and do you know how easy it would be for me to slip some into your locker, your bag, or even your food and water. Can you watch everything all of the time? It just takes one moment to plant evidence, for your life to be ruined.” Lila smiles, “So, are you ready to buy my lunch and carry my bags?” She holds her bag out to him.

Kim sighs and takes her bag, “Fine.”

* * *

Adrien stares at the screen, “That was horrible.”

Alya smirks, “Yeah, that bitch is going down.”

Marinette adds, “Don’t worry Adrien, Kim knows that there was a camera there, and we told him that everything was recorded. He’s going to play along for a little while so we can collect more evidence.”

“More evidence?”

“We want at least enough evidence to force her to leave Paris, but we’re hoping for enough to get her thrown in jail.”

Adrien frowns, “Why don’t you just bring this to the school and her mother?”

“When she first showed up and started pulling shit, she was exposed, and her mother has grounded her a few times, and she’s gotten detention from the school, but each time she just takes it out on the rest of us, usually in ways we can’t prove.”

“Do you know why she’s like this? I don’t like Lila, but isn’t there something that can be done that won’t ruin her life?”

Alya scowls, “You mean like how she’s been ruining our lives, and just threated Kim’s?”

Adrien shakes his head, “No, I mean, isn’t there some way to reach her?”

Marinette shakes her head, “No Adrien, this isn’t a kid’s show where the power of love will get her to change her ways. And no, we don’t know why she’s like this, nor does it seem that her mother knows either. She’s still a minor, but we’re hoping to get enough evidence that she can be moved to adult court. We’d be willing to let her go to juvenile, if she also receives therapy with a psychiatrist, and she’s on probation when she’s out. That will be her last chance, because we’ll be keeping tabs on her when she gets out. If she breaks probation, we’ll know and inform the police.”

“Yeah, I guess that sounds fair.”

“I’m sorry Adrien, I thought you’d enjoy that better, because I know you don’t like Lila.”

“Yeah, I don’t like her, but I don’t want to enjoy her misery.”

“Oh, I didn’t think that’s how it would seem to you. We’re happy because it’s a big relief for us. She now has less power over us, and we’re closer to restoring our names. It’s… hard enough making sure the people we care about are happy, or at least not going to get akumatized, trying to worry about someone that’s going out of their way to hurt us, it’s too much.”

“No, you’re right. I didn’t mean to be a drag. I am happy for you guys, and I am looking forward to not have photoshoots with her anymore. Hm, anyway, did you guys notice that Legend of Korra is on Netflix? Have you seen it before?”

Alya rubs her chin, “Isn’t it related to the weird Avatar movie? Not the one with the blue people, but the other one?”

Adrien facepalms, “Yeah, but the animated series it was based off of was way better. For one thing, the show had a sense of humor. It also had time to tell a story instead of a bunch of stuff happening, but you don’t know why. Ok, so first you need to watch, Avatar: The Last Airbender, and then you need to watch Legend of Korra. We’ll be having a pop quiz you on this next week, and it’ll be worth ten percent of your grade.”

Max adjusts his glasses, “Teacher’s don’t inform their students that they’ll have a pop quiz. I believe the ‘pop’ signifies the surprise of the quiz.”

Adrien nods sagely, “Noted, you’ll have a non-pop quiz on this next week, and it’ll be worth fifteen percent of your grade.”

Alya protests, “Hey, wasn’t it just ten percent?”

“Was it? It’s so hard to keep track with people protesting it. What was it again? Twenty percent?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was hoping this would be a lighter chapter (mood wise), but Adrien still needs some growing to do.


	17. Plagg

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien goes through his every day life, while waiting for Plagg to recover.

Nathalie 16.0 knocks on his door as she usually does in the morning, before giving Adrien his schedule for the day… it’s another boring day. Today is a full day of tutoring at home, and then Piano practice.

Adrien brushes his teeth and gets dressed while Sass eats his breakfast. Adrien has his own breakfast, and then spends until lunch with his morning tutor. After lunch, Adrien usually secretly talks to the home-school club a bit, but yesterday he was being a bit of a downer, or maybe they were actually wrong. He’s not sure if he actually wants to talk to them today. ‘ _Is this normal between friends? Are they even friends?_ ’ In the end, Adrien talked with them, and it was fine. Afternoon tutoring had come and gone, and now it was time to practice piano by himself.

Nathalie 16.0 called out to him while he was walking to him room, “Adrien!”

“Yes?” ‘ _I really need to learn her name._ ’

“There’s been a change in your schedule, you’ll be doing tomorrow’s Chinese lesson today, and Piano tomorrow. Your tutor will be here in a few minutes.”

Adrien nods and does his best to keep the disinterest in his voice, “Thank you.”

Once he’s in the safety of his own room, “Hey Sass, Master is visiting today…”

“Isss that ssso?”

“Yeah, he was supposed to come tomorrow. Do you think Plagg is awake?”

“Let’s hope so. Why don’t you check your phone?”

Adrien walks over to his desk and checks the hero chat phone app. “Hm, it looks like Tikki was returned to Ladybug already, but Ladybug is holding onto Mullo for a little while, for some reason.”

“I sssuppose we’ll find out why when Master arrivesss.”

After a few minutes, there’s a knock of Adrien’s door.

“Come in!”

Master Fu comes in and closes the door behind him. In Mandarin “Good Afternoon Adrien.”

Adrien responds back in Mandarin, “Good Afternoon Master.”

Master Fu glances at the door, as footsteps recede from the room. Master Fu smiles, “I’ve brought a friend with me today.” He pulls out a familiar box and hands it to Adrien.

Adrien opens the box, and squints his eyes as a ball of light floats around him.

Plagg forms out of a light, “I’ve missed you so much!”

“I’ve missed you too…” Adrien stops responding as he sees Plagg phase into his minifridge, “… of course, he misses his cheese.” Adrien puts the ring on his finger, and then opens the door to the minifridge.

“Brieanne! Look how you’ve aged! Ricky Ricotta, thank you for protecting these lovely ladies in my absence. Oh, Camemberta, sorry I’ve left you all alone for so long.” Plagg starts kissing his Camembert.

“Hey Plagg, how are you feeling?”

Plagg swallows Camemberta whole and then acts weak, “I’m feeling faint, I haven’t eaten in weeks. I also need a long cat nap, but I’m tough, and I should survive.” Plagg fakes a cough and slouches down.

Master Fu speaks up, “Plagg should be mostly fine now, but if you use his cataclysm, you’ll probably detransform faster than expected.”

Adrien frowns, “Our normal time limit is already pretty short, and puts us at a bit of a disadvantage.”

“That is why it might be best for you to hold onto Sass until Plagg has fully recovered. I’ve brought my gong and other tools with me, so we’ll have you practice healing Plagg, and I’ll leave them hear with you. You can heal him in your bathroom every day, so no one hears you. So, our lessons for today, we’ll review how to heal a kwami, and then we’ll go over how to use two miraculous at once.”

Adrien’s eyes light up, “We can do that?”

“Yes, but it’s not without risk. It can be pretty draining, and using too many Miraculous can break your body and or mind.”

“Oh…”

* * *

Dinner was its usual affair, Adrien and his Mother were sitting at the table, talking, while Gabriel’s chair remained empty.

“Adrien dear, I see you’re wearing your ring again.”

“Uh, yes. It’s been a few weeks, but I think having the ring is more me, you know?”

“Yes, I do. It’s important to have your own style. But you’re also wearing that bracelet too.”

“Yeah, I like the bracelet, but it didn’t feel right without my ring.”

“Hm, there is a time and place for everything, but wearing them both every day is too much flair for you. You should choose one and stick with it. Maybe bring out the other on special occasions.”

“Yeah, I was thinking the same thing, but I’d like to wear both for a couple weeks, you know, um, just so I can be sure which is the right one for me every day.”

“Very well, but don’t wear both during photoshoots.” Emilie narrows her eyes at the jewelry, “Those don’t belong to another designer, right? We can’t have photos of you promoting other’s work.”

Adrien covers his bracelet and ring, “No, no. They’re both from Gabriel’s Miraculous line. I asked for both of these to be in silver since that’d fit my look better, instead of being colored to look like the real Miraculous.”

“Oh, so are Chat Noir and, is it Carapace, or was it Viperion your favorite heroes?”

“Yeah, I think Chat Noir and Viperion are pretty cool, but actually, Ladybug is my favorite. I just didn’t think I could get earrings.”

“I suppose not. Earrings wouldn’t be a good look for you just yet. Maybe when you’re a bit older, and it’s time to get edgier.” Emilie smiles, “I’ve just had an idea. Maybe we can make it so guys can support Ladybug. That MDC girl submitted a design the other day, where the suit looked like it had Chat Noir colors, but the buttons and cufflinks looked like Ladybug’s earrings. I thought it was too much to have both heroes in the same outfit, but now I see it was to make up for the fact that there aren’t many manly ways to wear Ladybug’s colors.”

* * *

After dinner, Adrien finally had time alone with Plagg. “Hey Plagg, do you know why you guys got sick?”

Plagg responded by blowing bubbles out of his mouth.

Adrien looks at Plagg in confusion, “Well, that’s not the answer I was expecting.”

“Sorry kid, but magic prevents us from saying. I was asleep most of the time, so I don’t have much to say, what’s new with you?”

“Hm, well, I made some new friends.”

“How’d you do that? Did you finally go to school?”

“No, but I’ve met some kids that are also getting homeschool, so we’ve been chatting during lunch. I’ve also started going to the office, so I can learn about the business. I met MDC there, she’s interning there. We don’t usually have ungraduated interns, but she’s made outfits for Jagged Stone, so she was given an exception. MDC seems pretty cool, and maybe it’s because she wears a mask, but she kind of reminds me of Ladybug, and I get the feeling that she doesn’t like the Gabriel business.”

“Hm, then why is she working there?”

“I dunno, maybe to learn how businesses are run? The first time we met, she was at a photoshoot, and Lila was there, she wasn’t happy with Lila, called her manager and said she didn’t want to work with Lila again.”

“So, a good judge of character.”

“Maybe. I know Ladybug doesn’t like Lila either, but that doesn’t prove anything. She told me how a lot of our fabrics basically come from slave labor. She wants to change that, but said it’s hard to change a big company like Gabriel.”

“So, she wants to make the world a better place. You said that she was wearing a mask? Does that mean that MDC has a secret identity?”

“Yup.”

Plagg scarfs a piece of cheese, “So, if she was also Ladybug, it’s means she has three identities.”

“Yeah, it does seem like a bit much.”

“Tell me about these other friends of yours.”

Adrien goes on to talk about how he met them, how Lila got akumatized and framed them, causing them to get expelled, and how they were collecting evidence against her. How the Mayor’s crimes have been exposed and he has been stripped of his authority, with a criminal trial coming up soon. How he suspects that his new friends were involved with exposing the Mayor, as part of clearing their names. He talked about how they showed him articles and evidence that points towards his parents basically stealing the property from other people so they could build the mansion. He eventually got to how they’ve suggested he should get emancipated so he could go to school.

“What’s ‘Emancipated’?”

“Well, it means that a judge will declare me my own adult. It means I can make my own decisions, but it’ll probably hurt my mother a lot.”

“Kid, I know you want your mother to be happy, but if she wanted you to be happy, she’d let you go to school.”

Adrien slouches, “She’s just doing what she thinks is best for me.”

“Maybe you should think about this whole getting ‘Emancipated’ thing.”

“You really think so?”

“Thinking about it won’t hurt, always good to have options.”

“Hm. You’ve been rather serious today, are you sure you’re alright?”

Plagg waves his paw dismissively, “I’m fine, just too tired to be my normal charming self, or go around and explore.”

Sass continues watching Plagg and Adrien talk, wondering what Plagg is up to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All of the kwami know that a wish was made to change the past, but they don't have clear memories of the previous reality. Plagg believes that Adrien was happier in the previous reality, though he isn't sure why.
> 
> Plagg was also awake enough to listen to Ladybug talk to Master Fu during her visits, and she was asking for advice about civilian problems, so he knows that Ladybug, MDC, and the Marinette that's been chatting with Adrien are the same person, and that she's talking to Gorilla about getting Adrien emancipated, but that it's ultimately up to Adrien. Plagg also knows that she's hoping for Adrien to get emancipated before the Gabriel and Emilie's crimes and other misdeeds are exposed, to lessen the blow back on Adrien.


	18. We Match

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A few short weeks ago, Chloe was basically the Queen of Paris, and now she's just the daughter of a criminal, a criminal that most of Paris seems to suddenly hate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two chapters in one day!  
> This is a short one, but any Adrien-centric story requires him spending some time with his first friend.

It was the evening, Chloe had been curled up in a seat on the roof of her hotel for a while, wearing her Ladybug custom.

“Hey, we match!”

Chloe head snaps to the direction of the intruder. There’s a teenage boy standing on the roof. He’s wearing Ladybug’s outfit and has a yo-yo in his hand, but he has blond hair and green eyes. “Akuma!”

“What?” He looks around, “Oh, no, I’m not an akuma, I’m Misterbug.”

Chloe scoffs, and points at him, “Yeah, that’s not very convincing you Ladybug fanboy. What do you what? Whoever you are, I’ve done nothing, I haven't left the hotel for weeks because of the media trapping me here, so you have no reason to kidnap me or whatever.”

Misterbug sighs, “I’m not an Akuma, Ladybug and I traded Miraculous for patrol tonight, for practice, you know, just in case.”

Chloe’s eye’s narrow at him, “Are you saying that you’re that mangy alley cat?”

“Um, yes?”

“Well, whatever. At least you’re not an akuma. Now what do you want?”

Misterbug rubs the back of his neck, “I was just patrolling the area and I saw you up here. You look sad, do you want to talk about it?”

Chloe scoffs again, “Ridiculous, utterly ridiculous. It’s all over the news, you know what’s wrong, you’re just here to taunt me, aren’t you?”

Misterbug walks over and sits down next to her, “No, I’m not here to taunt you. I have seen the news, your father’s actions aren’t your fault, I just wanted to make sure you’re ok.”

Chloe looks away, “I’m fine.”

“Talking helps. Why don’t you call one of your friends?”

“I can’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“Aunt Emilie won’t let me talk to Adrien until this whole thing blows over. Sabrina’s parents took her phone and computer away, her father is under investigation due to our families’ closeness.”

“Isn’t there anyone else? What about your classmates?”

Chloe huffs, “I’m not friends with anyone else in class. That Lila bitch dropped me as soon as I wasn’t useful to her, and everyone else hates me.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

Chloe rolls her eyes, “Yeah, whatever.”

“Well, do you want to talk about things with me?”

Chloe glares at him, and then looks away again.

“Or I can sit here and keep you company for a while.”

Chloe didn’t respond, so Misterbug sits there in silence for a while, until he gets a message on his weapon. “I have to go and switch back Miraculous with Lady Noire. I’ll see you around.”

Chloe mutters a, “Whatever.”


	19. Statue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's been weeks since the last battle, but with all of their Kwami having recovered, they knew it was only a matter of time that they would have to fix a past mistake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whelp, I really was trying to finish this up in August, but I've had an eventful month and a half... still need to clean up the baking soda out of my carpet from my saving it from water damage from the broken hot water heater.  
> The whole story is more or less planned out, I just need to write it.

Ladybug arrived at the candlelit rooftop as Chat was pulling dinner out of a basket. “Hey Kitty!”

“Hey Bugaboo!”

Ladybug’s yo-yo started buzzing.

“Do you need to get that?”

“No, it can wait.” Ladybug sits down on the blanket. “The rose petals are a nice touch.”

“Thanks. I’ve been planning this for a while.”

There’s knocking on a window nearby.

“Should we check that out?”

“Don’t worry kitty, this is our night off.”

“That’s right Bugaboo, I’m all yours tonight.” Chat and Ladybug take a step towards each other and lean in for a kiss.

Suddenly Chat Noir is being shaken; his eyes shoot open to find Bunnix shaking him. “Hey! I’m up! What’s happening? Are you a hero or Akuma?”

“Relax Chat, wait don’t relax, get up!”

“What? Who’s Chat?”

“There’s no time for this. Transform and get out of here before it’s too late.”

“Too late?”

“Remember that statue that was stolen, of the Sentimonster? Well it’s going to wake up in about half an hour, and then it’s going to break into your home and eat you. That’s how I figured out who you were by the way.”

Adrien gulps at the thought of being eaten. “Where are the others?”

“Most are awake already and meeting at the Eiffel Tower. Rena is getting Ladybug up, and you need to go get Ryuko.”

“Plagg, Sass, you up?”

Plagg groans, “Yeah Kid, let’s get this over and go back to sleep.”

Sass hisses with is tongue, “Agreed.”

“Plagg, Claws out! Sass, Plagg, Unify!”

“I’ll watch from a safe distance; in case something goes wrong. Burrow!” Bunnix puts a foot into a portal before turning around and smirks at Snake Noir, “So, what exactly were doing to your Bugaboo in that dream of yours.” At the sight of Noir’s blush, Bunnix walks through the portal and it closes behind her.

* * *

On top of the Eiffel Tower, all of the heroes waited with Master Fu, looking out in all directions.

Snake Noir’s tail flicks before he speaks, “I see the Sentimonster, it’s a couple of blocks away. Second Chance! Sass, Plagg, Divide!”

The whole group turns to look at Chat Noir.

Chat takes off the Snake Miraculous and hands it to Master Fu, “Master, you need to use Second Chance. The Lucky Charm was a metal detector, but Feast has nothing on it, so we’re thinking that it ate the object, and My Lady and I need to get eaten to break it.”

Master Fu raised his fist showing the Snake Miraculous already being worn, “Sass, Scales Slither! Second Chance!”

“Lucky Charm!” A metal detector lands in Ladybug’s hands, “Ok Kitty! Let’s do this!” Ladybug and Chat Noir jump off the Eiffel Tower and race towards Feast.

The team loses sight of them, but after a minute, Ladybugs swarm the city. Ryuko mutters, “That was anticlimactic.” The rest nod in agreement.

Rena turns to look at the Snake themed Master Fu, “Master, you told Ladybug that the Sentimonster ate all of the other Guardians and Miraculous, do you think they’re back at the temple now?”

Master Fu sighs, “Why is your generation so bad at keeping secrets?”

Rena raises her eyebrow, “Did you tell Ladybug not to tell me about that?”

Master Fu shakes his head, “I suppose not. To answer your question, 175 years is a long time, I don’t know is the cure is powerful enough to fix that, but it is possible.”

“Cool, so when are we going?”

“I’d like to the Butterfly and Peacock Miraculous before I return.”

“That sounds nice and all, but what if they have a Miraculous or spell that can help us find them.”

Pegasus adjusts his glasses, “There is a 0.032% chance that people from 175 years ago will be able to navigate modern society without proper assistance. Where is this temple located?”

Rena hums, “I think Ladybug said Tibet.”

“What about Tibet?” Ladybug and Chat Noir land back on the tower.

“The temple of the Guardians. We should check it out; see if the Guardians are back or at least their Miraculous and spell books.”

“Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. Master?”

Master Fu had his eyes closed, thinking about what they were saying, “Very well. Ladybug, Chat Noir, and I will go. The rest of you should go back to bed, we’ll collect the Miraculous from the temporary heroes, and I will need to Horse Miraculous back from the time being.”

* * *

“Voyage! Here’s hoping everyone is well, and they won’t try to take the Miraculous back.” Master Fu steps through the portal.

Chat Noir looks at Ladybug, “He was joking? Right?”

Ladybug looks back at him, “Um, I don’t think so.”

“Yeah, kinda figured.” They both walk through the portal to find them on a cliff, with the temple in the distance. “Um, Master, why are we so far away?”

Master Fu pointed a bit away from the Temple, where there were some tents and lights set up. “They’re still excavating around where they found Feast, hoping to find more, and I’m sure they’ve noticed the Temple was fixed by the ladybugs. We don’t know what we’ll find at the temple, but we should approach from the other side and sneak in.” So that’s what they did.

As they approached, it was obvious that parts of the temple were neglected for over a hundred years, but then right next to those parts were parts of the temple that looked well cared for. As Chat looked at the temple, he could only compare it to some of those old cartoons, where a part of a wall looked different, and it was clear it was going to explode as an enemy charges through it or something.

As they approached, the far side of the temple, they could hear someone yelling at the door to open. They stuck to the wall, and peered around the corner, to see one of the French archeologists on the phone, telling someone how the temple was magically fixed and then the door was suddenly locked.

A Chinese archeologist was also on the phone, causing Master Fu to frown, “I think he’s talking to someone in the Chinese government. A locked door might hold back some archeologists, but it won’t stop a government.” Fu looks up, “Let’s enter through that window. We have to be quick in our explanation of events, and then evacuate everyone.”

Ladybug frowns, “Where would we evacuate them to? I think my parents would notice if strangers suddenly moved in.”

“I have many safe houses set up throughout Europe, if we can split the guardians up, then it should be fine… assuming they allow themselves to be split up, and are willing to evacuate.”

“With the internet, they should be able to keep in touch with each other, but we’ll have to teach them how to use it first.”

Chat shakes his head, “Why do I get the feeling this will be like herding cats?”

Ladybug smirked, “More like herding Chat Noirs.”

With that, the three of them jump through the window, and into a room with several Guardians… is everyone here a Guardian? Or are most of them Guardians in Training or something? Whatever, there were several people looking at the three of them while they all kept guarded-ian stances.

Master Fu mutters his detransformation phase, he catches Kaalki and hands her a sugar cube. In Mandarin, Fu introduces himself, and Chat translates for Ladybug, “Master Tenzin, I know it must be hard to hear, but I am Fu Wang. It’s been over 170 years since you and the Miraculous were eaten, the world has changed much in this time, and the temple won’t be safe for long. Please gather everyone, we have much to discuss.”

Master Tenzin studied Fu for a moment before nodding, “Gather everyone in the meeting hall. You three follow me.” He turns around and walks out of the room. They follow him down some hallways, without anyone saying anything, and they end up in a large room, that is probably the meeting hall. “We’ve already checked, and everyone at the temple was accounted for except for Fu Wang. Tell me, what were you doing at the time of the attack?”

Master Fu frowned as his eyes starts to water, “I was doing my 24-hour training watching over my Miracle Box. I was also using the Peacock Miraculous to sneak myself some food, but you know how that turned out.”

“I see.” The pause lingered for a few moments as Tenzin contemplated, “I see you brought three of the Miraculous with you, but where are the rest?”

As they continued to talk, people started to enter the room and group together as they watch the three strangers.

“Well, that’s one of the issues at hand. Most of the Miraculous are stored in my home, or are with trusted allies, except for the Butterfly and Peacock, and their current wielders have exposed the Miraculous to the entire world, and they are villains that have been attacking civilians to track and capture the Ladybug and Black Cat. With the Archeologists outside banging on the temple door, I wouldn’t be surprised if the whole world knew about the temples return within an hour, and the Butterfly could arrive shortly after.”

“Around the world? That quickly?”

“Yes, much has changed in the last 170 years. There are devices that allow any human around the world can talk to another, hear their voice and see their face even. The reason it’d take an hour is everyone outside is either talking to their friends, family, or government. It’ll take about an hour to travel word of mouth before the gossip merchants can tell everyone else.”

Master Tenzin looks around the room, “Everyone is here.” He turns to the head of the room, “Master Gyatso, Master Jinpa, and Master Jesa; I believe everyone is now accounted for, as this man says that he is Fu Wang and that 170 years have passed since we’ve all been eaten.” Murmurs broke through the room before the elder masters responded.

* * *

Chat continued to translate conversation for Ladybug for what seemed like forever. The elder masters (Grandmasters? Grandguardians?), had way too many questions. They were clearly upset at Master Fu, and they wanted to dismiss the idea that they needed to abandon the temple, but they also seemed to recognize that he was no longer the same 11-year-old child that made the mistake of creating the sentimonster.

Everyone was startled when Ladybug’s Yo-yo started buzzing, “Sorry!” She opens up her Yo-yo and answers the call, it was Rena.

“Hey Girl, there’s already news articles about the temple being restored, and one of my sources says TVi will have a camera crew in a helicopter at the temple in about 20.”

“20 minutes? How is that possible?”

“Apparently they already had a crew in the area for whatever reason.”

“Ok, thanks Rena. Is there anything else? I need to get these guys moving.”

“No, that’s it. Bye!”

“Bye!” Ladybug clears her throat, “News of the restoration of the temple has already reached France, and there will be a camera crew arriving in a helicopter in 20 minutes.”

Master Fu translated and informed the guardians about the update, but they continued to stall and ask questions until they heard the helicopter approach, and then Ladybug was able to pull up the live feed and show it to all of them. It was then that the guardians finally seemed to acknowledge how little they understood the modern world.

The three other grand masters look at each other and nod to Master Tenzin before he speaks up, “Everyone, it seems that to keep the Miraculous safe, we have no choice but to abandon our temple. Gather everything that we can find. We will split into groups, and Fu Wang will take us to safe locations across Europe. We will need to learn about the last 170 years, and about the current world. After that, we’ll need to learn how to blend in and find a new home to keep the miraculous safe.” Everyone splits up, leaving the four grand guardians with Fu, Ladybug, and Chat.

Fu cleared his throat, “There is something else that you might be able to help us with.”

“Go on.”

“A few weeks ago, all of the Kwami fell asleep, and spent days asleep. Even using healing techniques, it still took a while. Has this ever happened before?”

Tenzin looks at the three of them, “You have no idea what could have caused it?”

“No, everything was well when we went to sleep, and when we woke up, the Kwami were ill. They haven’t been able to tell us what happened.”

“I see. Well, what it means is that someone used the Ladybug and Black Cat Miraculous to make a wish.”

“What?!?!” cried out both Chat Noir and ladybug.

Ladybug stepped up, “But we never lost our Miraculous!”

“And we never made the wish ourselves.”

Tenzin stroked his beard, “That may very well be true, but the wish has the power to change not only the current reality, and the past as well. They may have wished to change the past, which meant they didn’t need to take the Miraculous from you.”

Master Fu’s eyes fill with worry, “They Kwami didn’t tell us. Is there any way to find out what the wish was?”

“The Kwami have a vague sense of what it was, but they can’t tell us. That protects the wish from being undone. It is possible to learn what the wish was, but it’ll require the right spell and ingredients. All of our ingredients have long since perished, so we’ll have to find more, and we’ll have to find the grimoire with the specific spell, hopefully we still have it.”

“I see. If we could find that, it may very well help identify our enemy.”

“Very well, we’ll make it one of our priorities.”

* * *

Tom Dupain was turning on the ovens to start the day, when he heard a knocking on the door. “The suns not even up yet, who could it be?” He walked out of the kitchen and into the storefront, to find Ladybug and Chat Noir knocking. After opening the door, he asks, “Is there an akuma?”

Ladybug waves her hands, “Oh, It’s nothing like that, Da-er-Sir. You might have not seen the news yet, but after the last attack, a temple full of monks was restored, and they’re going to need some food. We don’t need anything fancy, actually, quantity is more important than quality.”

“Now, you don’t come to the best bakery in Paris and say that the quality isn’t important. How many people do we need food for, and for how long?”

“About 120 people, and we don’t know for how long, but if we can start with enough to get through today. Someone will drop by in a bit to pick up the first batch. Oh, and if you could make sure your family doesn’t tell anyone?”

“Of course.”


	20. No Girls Allowed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Max hosts a boy's day at his apartment to playtest the latest updates of his game.

At last, school was finally over for the day. Alix wasn’t sure what she said to get Kim to start gushing about his swimming partner/girlfriend, but ug, it was gross and needed to be stopped. “Hey Kim, I bet…”

“Negative! If you finish that sentence, I’m 99.98235% certain that you’ll throw off our tight schedule for today.”

Alix turns to see Max walking up the school steps to meet her and Kim. Alix smiles, it’s been so weird being around Kim every day without Max to balance him. “Hey Max, what are the plans for today?”

“Sorry Alix, we’re having a boys’ day at my house to test the latest version of my game. Most of the boys in class are joining.”

Alix raises her eyebrow at him, “So what? I’m not boy enough to hang out with you guys?”

“Well, um, technically, um…”

Alix laughs, “Chill, I’m just messing with you.”

Max pushes his glasses up, “I see. Well, as I mentioned, we’re on a tight schedule, so we’ll see you later Alix.”

\--

The fencers have finished their stretches and had begun pairing up with their masks down. Everyone had a partner except Kagami, hold on, someone in fencing gear just left the locker room and is heading over to Kagami.

One of the guys watches as he talks to his partner, “Hey, do you know who that is with Kagami? Looks too short to be Adrien.”

“Who knows.”

“Should we tell someone?”

“Why? Do you want to go against Kagami?”

“No, but…”

“Just leave it. Think of it this way, both Kagami’s and Adrien’s schedules are insane. If Kagami wants to spend time with a friend, or Adrien wants to play hooky, do you want to mess with that.”

“I guess not. Do you think that person is Kagami’s secret boyfriend?”

“I’m pretty sure that’s a girl, so I doubt she’s Kagami’s boyfriend.”

“Oh, do you think that girl is single?”

“If she’s even half as intense as Kagami, do you think you could survive her?”

“Probably not. Hm, it doesn’t look like she’s ever fenced before, but wow her reflexes are pretty crazy.”

A throat clears behind them, it’s Mr. D’Argencourt. “Enough chit-chat, it’s time for practice.”

“Sorry Sir.”

“Sorry Sir. En-garde!”

* * *

Adrien climbs out of the locker room window, and closes it behind him. Looking around to make sure there’s no one to rat him out, he sneaks to the back of the school, and stealthily gets into a car.

Gorilla grunts, and begins driving to their destination. A few minutes later, they arrive at a non-descript apartment building.

Adrien was super excited, he’s never been in apartment building before, at least not outside of an akuma attack which left him a bit distracted. Adrien’s also excited because he’s going to hang out with the boys, and he’s never hung out with the boys before. Hopefully he’ll fit in, how hard can it be? He’s a boy, the hard part is already done, right? Great, now he’s nervous.

Adrien and Gorilla get out of the car, to find Max and some young man walking towards them. Wait, that’s not a man, that’s one of the other kids from the Akuma class. Oh, Max used to be in the akuma class, which means that most of the boys will probably be from the akuma class as well. He’s talked to all of them as Chat, he’s going to have to pretend to meet them all for the first time.

“Good afternoon Adrien, I’d like to introduce you to my best human friend, Kim Le Chien. Kim, I’d like you to meet my new friend and home school buddy, Adrien Agreste.”

“Nice to meet you Kim.”

“Cool to meet you too. Hey, I bet I can beat you in Max’s game.”

“Um, probably. I haven’t played it before.”

“Oh, well, I bet I can beat you while I’m wearing a blindfold.”

Adrien shrugs, “Um, sure. What does the winner get?”

“Hm, how about the winner gets to draw on the losers face with permanent marker?”

Adrien pales at that, but is thankfully saved by Max.

“Kim, Adrien had to sneak out of his to join us. If his mother finds out, he’ll be in serious trouble. So, no penalties today.”

Kim huffs, “Fiiine.”

Max adjusts his glasses, “Let’s get inside and get ready for the others.”

* * *

Max’s apartment was rather comfy, but it was a little crowded once everyone arrived. Gorilla spent his time reading Max’s comics in a chair off in the corner of the room. Adrien ended up spending the time sitting on the floor next to a kid named Nino, aka The Bubbler. Apparently, Ladybug shoved him and Alya (aka Lady Wi-fi, aka the Ladyblogger) in a cage together during an akuma attack, and now they’re dating. Stoneheart is dating Horrificator, they got together with help from both Ladybug and Marinette. Kim, aka Dark Cupid was dating Syren. It wasn’t confirmed, but based on how Evillustrator and Reverser were acting, he thinks they’re dating. Well, really, Adrien had no idea about the signs to tell if they were dating, so it’s more based on the fact that they were sitting next to each other, had inside jokes with each other, and the fact that apparently Marinette introduced them to each other, he’s going to make the jump and say that Marinette did that to help romance.

Max’s game itself was pretty fun. Max had a lot of insight into the abilities of some lesser known akumas. He must have been consulting with Alya to figure a lot of this out.

Apparently, the Bubbler, er, Nino is an aspiring DJ, and has been making his own mixes, so Adrien gave Nino his email, so he could listen to the mixes. Hopefully this means he has a new friend.

Before he knew it, fencing time was over, and Adrien had to return home, leaving the boy’s behind to finish play testing the game.

As the car began to move, Adrien looked at Gorilla through the rear view mirror, “Thanks for bringing me here today, I had a lot of fun.”

Gorilla grunts in response.

When Adrien got home, he went to his room at sat in his chair, staring at his computer with the monitor still turned off. Today wasn’t as exciting as being a superhero, or presumably a roller-coaster, but it was fun, safe, and when it wasn’t his turn to play, he was just chilling with the boys. At least Adrien thinks it was chilling, yeah, it’s probably the right usage for it. Why wasn’t he allowed to do this before?

While Adrien was sitting there contemplating, there was a ping on his phone; Nino had emailed some of his tunes over, so Adrien turned on his computer monitor and started listening.


	21. Bugaboy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Misterbug and Lady Noir are on the job again after their training session is interrupted. Unfurrtunately, Misterbug isn't acting his normal cheerful self.

Misterbug stared at the lucky charm, unsure what to do with it. They were intending to practice with each other’s miraculouses again, but of course an akuma popped up.

Lady Noir lands on the roof a few feet away from him, “Have you figured it out, Bugaboy?”

“I’m trying, but I’m too stupid to figure it out.”

Lady Noir frowns, “Kitty, you’re not stupid. Don’t you know like several languages?”

“Yeah, but they’re stupid languages.”

“Aren’t you also really good at math and physics?”

“Whatever.” Misterbug handed her the Lucky Charm, “You figure it out.”

“Fine, but we’re talking about this after the Akuma.” Chat didn’t respond.

* * *

After a quick call to Rena Rouge, Lady Noir and Misterbug engaged with the akuma and brought it away from civilians to enact the plan. The plan was a straightforward one, one that could be used fairly often if the akumas weren’t controlled by someone that would catch on and ruin things. An illusion of the heroes on a nearby rooftop, dodging the akuma’s attacks was the distraction, as the heroes snuck up behind the akuma. Ideally, the heroes would sneak up on the akuma for every battle and end things quickly, though the problem with that plan is the civilians who start cheering for the heroes, giving away the element of surprise. Ok, so maybe Paris as a whole is generally stupid, not just Misterbug for not being able to figure out the obvious lucky charm.

A few minutes after defeating the akuma, Ladybug and Chat Noir land on a secluded rooftop. Ladybug takes a moment to examine her gloomy partner. She sits down and pats the roof, signaling for Chat to sit next to her. After he sits, she gently asks, “Hey Chat, what’s wrong? Do you want to talk about it?”

Chat huffs, “I can’t talk about it, civilian stuff.”

“That’s fine, just be a bit vague about it.” Ladybug watches Chat as he contemplates for a little bit.

“It’s…” Chat rubs the back of his neck, “well… I’ve been learning how my parent’s business works. Most of the employees have kept their distance from me, so it’s been a bit of a challenge to figure out all of the ins and outs. I… um… I know it’s rude, but I decided to start eavesdrop on the employees to find out what they didn’t like about their work, so maybe I could find a way to improve things. I figured, if I made the employees happy, it’d be easier to get to know them. After some time, I was able to come up with a plan that would make it so the employees wouldn’t have to do a disliked task, which would make them happier and save them time, and actually save the company some money. I tried to talk to my mother about it, but she said she was too busy, so I wrote up the plan with all of the relevant numbers in a brief document and made an appointment a few days later when she’d have more time. When I started presenting my idea to her, she threw the document into the trash and said that you can’t run a business on childish ideals.”

After a moment of silence, Ladybug decides that Chat is probably done with his story. “Chat, if your idea can save money and make the employees happier, then it’s a really good idea. It’s not your fault that your mother isn’t taking you seriously. It sounds like you’re being treated as a little kid instead of a young adult, but even then, a parent would normally at least pretend their little kid’s artwork is pretty even if it’s not. When I was little, my parents taught my everything about the family business. They even had me help out with advertising and going over the budget. Not just the budget for the business, but the budget for our home. They taught me about how the seasons, holidays, and even daily weather effects the business. Even for a simple business there’s so many things to think about. When a piece of equipment would fail, we’d look up replacements, see if there’s something better than our old model. Once, I remember we found something that looked really good, and we were going to buy it, but then my parents started talking about the size of the thing, it was only a tiny bit bigger, but to get it to fit we’d have to move other things around, which would break up the work flow, so my parents figured it’d make us less productive, so we went back to the old model and got another one of those. Another time, I drew up an advertising flier, and when my mom looked at it, she said I’d have to do it again because it looked racist. I was shocked, because I don’t hate other people based on the color of their skin, but my mother explained how I was using racist stereotypes. I just thought they were funny caricatures, but if I still had that flier and looked at it today, I’d probably be appalled with what I did. Um, I guess what I’m trying to say is that your mother should have looked at the presentation, and if there was something she didn’t like, she should have explained it to you. How is she supposed to expect you to take over the family business if she doesn’t teach it to you? If anyone is stupid, I think it’s mother.”

Chat snorts, “I don’t think my mother would take it very well if I went up to her and told her she was stupid.” Chat frowns, “I’m not sure what my mother would say to that, but my father would scold me for having emotions again just like my mother.”

Ladybug clenches her fist, while struggling to hold back asking Chat who his father was so she could go and punch him. She’s pretty sure Chat’s father is sick or something, but that doesn’t mean she’d hold back on him. Ladybug releases a calming breath before speaking. She bumps shoulders with Chat, “So Chat, now that you know you’re not stupid, do you think you’ll be up to the test next time we swap Miraculous, Bugaboy?”

Chat huffs, and responds in a voice mocking Ladybug, “Don’t call me Bugaboy.”

Ladybug giggles in response and watches Chat as a smile breaks out on his face.

* * *

Closing her textbook, homework finished, Marinette stretches as she lets out a yawn. “Hey Tikki, my history homework is done, am I forgetting anything?”

“Um, you did all of your homework. Did you text Adrien today?”

“Oh right, he had that meeting with his mother today.” Marinette grabs her phone and starts texting.

Marinette: Hey Adrien, how did the meeting with your mother go?

Adrien: Not good

Marinette: Do you want to talk about it?

Adrien: Thanks, but I’ve already vetted to another friend

Marinette: Ok

Marinette: You know where to find me if you want to talk about anything

Marinette: Or if youd like to play a few rounds of Ultimate Mecha Strike

Adrien: That’d be great, can you be ready in 3 minutes?

Marinette: Sure can


End file.
